


Disaster Gladiators

by not_whelmed_yet



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: Action, Alternate Universe - Gladiators, Cage Fights, Canon-Typical Violence, Empurata, Ensemble Cast, Functionist Universe (Transformers), Hurt/Comfort, Kissing, M/M, Medical Trauma, Romance, Torture, a surprising amount of kissing, suicide ideation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-18
Updated: 2019-01-18
Packaged: 2019-10-12 00:09:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,734
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17456903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/not_whelmed_yet/pseuds/not_whelmed_yet
Summary: One of the most popular entertainment programs within the Black Box Consortia streams cage matches fought by Cybertronian captives.Whirl's been in the gladiator business a good long time. He's ready to get gone. Luckily for him, there's a new challenger who can maybe make that happen.





	Disaster Gladiators

**Author's Note:**

> 🎉🎉 Disaster Gladiators is finally ready to post! This fic has been an _adventure_ y'all. I'd initially planned to write it for the first half of nanowrimo...and now it's finally finished in mid-January. The concept (cywhirlgate gladiator romance) has been rattling around in my head even longer than that.
> 
> This is a Functionist Universe story, which is to say, the universe kinda sucks. I guess it's not _disproved_ by canon - JRo neglected to definitively state that Whirl and Orion Pax _weren't_ gladiators sold by the Functionist Council to the BBC. 😉 That said, I usually play pretty tight to canon compliant. In this fic...not as much. I've messed with Cyclonus's backstory & the worldbuilding around it a lot.
> 
> Not much else to say in the intro except that I hope you enjoy! If you want background music - this fic is dedicated to The Mountain Goats album [Beat the Champ](https://open.spotify.com/album/7HWC61Sl93gYdBqCV5EIka).
> 
> If there's anything I've neglected to tag, let me know & I'll add that in.

>   _I loved you before I even ever knew what love was like_
> 
> _\- Hair Match [The Mountain Goats]_
> 
>  

The magnet released his leg with a clank, sending Whirl falling head-first towards the mesh floor of the cage. With a quick spin of his rotors, he managed to flip that uncontrolled faceplant into a aft-backwards tumble.

He made several rude gestures at the electromagnetic crane before reassuring the others. “I'm fine!” He yelled. “I let him win on purpose.”

Impactor snorted from somewhere on the other side of the cage. “Sure ya did.”

“I do not need your sass right now.” Whirl blinked his optic at the darkness above, trying to make his head stop ringing. The smoke from the arena swirled, carrying sparks to beat against the ceiling in waves. _Damn that bot could hit._ “I let Big Blue win _on purpose_ because I didn't want to embarrass him. Because I'm a team player. You could learn a thing or two from my example, _Drillbit._ ”

“My name is Impactor,” Impactor said.

“Sure it is, Drillbit.”

There was a creaking grinding noise. Not a _whining_ grinding noise, like the crane made. Nah, this was the gate, which meant—

“Whirl!” Tailgate ran across the cage to throw himself down by Whirl's side. He leaned over, blue visor filling Whirl's vision as he patted at the side of Whirl's helm. “Are you with me? We'll get you to the medic, don't worry.”

“Wha, me?” Whirl said, pushing Tailgate away with his good claw. “I'm fine. Just peachy. Tip-top shape, that's me.” He used his claw on Tailgate's shoulder to sit up.

“He crushed your claw!” Tailgate said, pointing at the offending extremity. “How could he?”

Whirl considered his not-good claw. It was, indeed, very squished from where Orion had stomped on it. “This?” He said. “This is nothing. Just a little stagecraft from me and Big Blue. The boys downstairs get a little tetchy if nobody gets grievously wounded by the end of a fight—this is showy but it doesn't hurt.” He clicked the twisted pinchers together. _Hinge still worked just fine._

“You're going to the medic, now,” Tailgate said, crossing his arms.

“I'll wait for a second opinion.”

“ _Medic._ _Now._ ”

Whirl pushed himself all the way to his feet. His legs didn't much like that idea and sent him listing off to the left and then staggering into the cage wall like he was caught in a low-altitude thermal. He caught himself on the mesh of the wall and pulled himself to his full, very impressive, height. “I think I'll wait,” he said.

He looked around. Something was wrong. He interrupted Tailgate before he could speak again. “Where's Big Blue? Why's he not up here yet?”

The rest of the prisoners looked over from where they'd clustered at the far side of the cage, looking through the mesh. They stared at him and didn't say anything helpful. Whirl considered asking again, more annoyingly, but then Pious Maximus—the more self-important Maximus—spoke up.

“The show isn't over,” Pious said. “I think there's another challenger.”

“Look for your damned self,” Impactor grouched.

Whirl glanced down and  nearly lost his last meal in a sickening rush. His gyros had _not_ recalibrated from that drubbing Orion had given him.

The prison was a perfect circle, smooth impenetrable walls all the way down to the smelting pool that encircled the ring. The smelting pool was entirely pointless—there was no way to escape. Even flying straight up was out; there was a laser grid that activated during fights. And where would you go? There was nothing above the ring but the cage and, above that, the ceiling.

And way, way down at the bottom there was Orion Pax, lit bloody by the pink of the smelting pool. He was on his feet, hemmed in by the laser grid they used to contain fighters before a match. His bulky claws were held loose at his sides and his single blue optic looked out over the ring in unconcerned neutrality. Orion didn't react to much. Whirl had heard Impactor opine it was because of the newspark he'd let die in here. Whirl figured it took a lifetime of losing people to send a bot that that far into their own plating.

Orion was watching the center of the ring—Whirl was too. The very center had a platform that could be lowered out of the ring to bring up surprise challengers. Wild animals and random mechs the consortium had captured at war, mostly. Not too surprising, but usually those kinds of matches went _early_ in the night and the big Cybertronian versus Cybertronian match-ups went last. This was new.

Tailgate stepped up to his side and peered down. “What's happening?” he asked. “There's just nothing.”

“Commercial break,” Whirl said. “For the audience back home.” He was just guessing.

“Well, when's something going to—”

The fires of the pool below lit blue and a strut-rattling drone poured out of the speakers above them. Tailgate jumped.

“—happen?”

A starscape lit across the floor and the dark walls of the arena, then filled in the space between as the hologram projectors kicked on. A voice boomed in the darkness and—Primus have mercy—the “dramatic“ music started.

“Oh, fuck, this again?”

“Shhh!” Fortress Maximus, the Shorter and Younger Maximus, hissed. “Skids is trying to listen.”

“Shh? It's loud enough to hear on Luna I, it doesn't matter if I sing a old Cybertronian drinking song. Speakers _up to eleven_ because they couldn't just add the fragging drama _in post!_ ”

“Whirl.” Soundwave spoke up from his spot at the center of the cage. Everyone turned to gape. Whirl hadn't thought Soundwave knew his name. Hell, Whirl wasn't sure Soundwave knew where he _was_. He only ever seemed alive in the ring. “We can't hear Skids.”

Whirl took the hint and let Skids translate. Skids was an “outlier“, like Windcharger and Trailbreaker, which was to say he could do weird shit. Weird shit like pick up the language the Consortium's announcers used. His abilities—like Soundwave's—were subtle enough that he hasn't ended up slapped in inhibitor cuffs to cut them off like the other two.

Below them, Orion was lost in the hologram starscape. Whirl strained his optic, but there was nothing to _see_ in the darkness. Just stars.

“He says they found an anomaly in space. A place where the...don't know that word...was ripped? Broken?” Skids said. “They investigated.”

The starscape ruptured, splitting open like a tectonic fissure of jagged edges and leaking space. The music rose to an even more grating crescendo.

“They found a thing that was dead—wait, maybe he meant dying? Um, the dying thing killed—oh Primus—I think he just said five hundred soldiers. They captured it and, oh here we go, the normal patter. They “trained it to kill on command“ guys.”

“Didn't he just say it killed five hundred people?” Fort Max said dryly.

“Probably didn't take long, then,” Pious agreed.

“I think they're talking about experimenting on the poor guy, but I don't know these words. I caught “lab“ and “compliance“.”

“Yada, yada, yada, we get it. Found a tough dude in space, gonna have him pulverize Big Blue. Can we get on with it?” Whirl rattled his claw against the cage.

“Whirl!” Tailgate admonished. “That's our friend.”

“Friend? Uh-uh. I ain't friends with any of you losers. I'm on Team Whirl over here.”

Impactor snorted.

“Keep your mouth shut, Drillbit!”

“It was,” Impactor said.

Only Whirl's curiosity about the Consortium's new challenger kept him from slugging the smartaft out of Impactor. As he watched, the starscape cleared like smoke, revealing the center platform as it rose out of the darkness.

There was a mech on the platform and for a moment Whirl thought he was dead. His plating was the dull grey of death.

But the red lights of his optics glinted as he raised his chin to face Orion. He was tall for a mech, though shorter than Whirl, with a bodytype that screamed “aerial“. Two horns rose from his helm like a warrior of old. He jerked his head back, mouth falling open like he was taking in the smell of the smoke and fuel.

“An empty,” Pious said. “He's an empty.”

“There ain't no such thing,” Impactor said.

“There is.” Fortress said. “I saw them, when I was working on the force. A mech gets hungry enough, he doesn't know when his body's giving up on him. There's nothing left but the hunger.”

“Is that why he's faded like that?” Skids asked.

“I don't know,” Pious said.

“I know him,” Tailgate said, quietly.

Everyone looked over. Below them, the mech swayed on his feet, and the air hung still.

“I mean, I know who he is,” Tailgate amended. “That's Cyclonus of Tetrahex. He was on the Ark when it went missing.”

The quiet was broken as the pool below flooded pink again and the laser grid holding Orion fell away. Orion surged forwards and ducked around Cyclonus, swinging his claw at the back of his helm like a hammer.

The blow hit Cyclonus with a clang and sent him sprawling forwards. Whirl winced. So much for the Consortium's new champion.

Orion pressed his advantage, stepping forward to take a finishing blow at the mech's undefended neural cluster. He was being pragmatic—he knew he was weak from the earlier fights. But still...

“Come on, Cyclonus!” Whirl yelled. “Show us what you've got!”

From the ring floor, red eyes met his gaze, inscrutable over the distance. People were yelling at him, but Whirl didn't care. He was busy watching as Cyclonus rolled to his feet and, like a phantom, side-stepped Orion's strike. Cyclonus drove his foot into Orion's knee with a crack, sending him staggering. Then he pounced.

Clawed hands, Primus, Whirl had _not_ noticed the talons, gripped Orion by the helm and then drove into his undefended optic. Orion thrashed but the mech held tight, dipping his head to the crux of Orion's neck and rending the fuel lines with his fangs.

Shocked silence fell as lurid fuel gushed out over the floor of the ring. Cyclonus hunched over Orion, sucking at the fuel with animal desperation. The lights began to flash red and the announcer blared on, a message Whirl had heard too many times to need translating. The match was over.

Cyclonus clearly didn't recognize the call to stand down, or he did and he didn't care. He stayed right where he was until the first volt gun hit him. It took another three to knock him offline, sending his body sprawling out over Orion's.

“Is he dead?” Tailgate asked. Whirl wrapped one arm around him as the crane slowly lowered to the floor and lifted Orion up to them. The others gathered underneath it, taking hold of his body as the magnets released, circled around him like a pallbearers.

Soundwave touched a hand to Orion's helm, then stepped back away. “He's alive.”

“We have to get him down to medical,” Pious said. “Tailgate?”

“Go on, Legs,” Whirl said. He gave Tailgate a little push. Tailgate jolted, then hurried towards the gate. He waved his hand over the controls and, with a horrific creaking noise, the door rolled up. Tailgate led the procession out onto the narrow walkway to the elevator. Windcharger, Trailbreaker and the Maxes stayed as the honor guards while Impactor and Skids walked back to the cage.

The cell was now very empty. There was Turmoil, of course. He hadn't bothered to get up when Orion was returned to them. And there was Soundwave, impassive as always. Thunderclash and Dai Atlas were already down in medical from an earlier fight.

Impactor stomped off towards a empty part of the cell, because he was the sort of mech who liked to express his feelings by stomping a lot. Skids just stood there, chest heaving like he'd won a melee battle, arms soaked to the elbows in Orion's fuel.

Whirl stood very still, but _trying_ to stand still somehow made Skids notice him sooner.

“You.” Skids marched up to him, but stopped himself a few feet out. “What in Primus-fuck were you on about back there? Orion _had him_.”

“I don't know! You know me, sometimes I do stupid impulsive slag. I didn't think he'd hear me, let alone do _that_.”

Skids huffed something under his breath that sounded like “crazy“. He walked to the cage wall and looked down. Cyclonus was still there, body still. “Are they just going to leave him there?”

As if on cue, the electromagnetic crane began to lower itself towards the floor again with a rattle of its chain. It fastened itself to Cyclonus's chest, then began to lift him upwards.

“Oh no. Oh, _hell_ no.” Skids muttered. He backed away from the wall, murder in his eyes.

What was the Consortium thinking? Even Whirl could see what a bad idea this was—sure, Cyclonus was nominally a Cybertronian. At least according to Tailgate. Whirl had never heard of him. But there was a reason the challengers were kept somewhere _else_. With Cyclonus unconscious, there'd be nothing to stop the Orion Pax Fan Club from ripping him to pieces. And from what they saw in the ring, if he woke up there'd be nothing to stop _him_ from ripping _them_ to pieces.

Great.

He loved having to be the voice of reason. His absolute top-ten, favorite thing to do.

“Hey, don't do what you're thinking,” Whirl said, optic tracking the slow ascent of Cyclonus's body. Impactor was moving over to Skids' side, because if there was a chance to fight on a side that wasn't Whirl's, Impactor was on it. The others—Soundwave and Turmoil—were watching too, but they didn't look like they'd get off their afts to intercede.

Whirl held up his claws defensively, watching the crane out of the corner of his optic and shuffling his feet to follow it. “You know you can't touch him.”

“Why are you standing up for him?” Skids snarled. “You saw what he did!”

“Yeah, Whirl, what's it matter to you?” Impactor drawled. “I guess crazy monsters have to stick together.”

“You know why,” Whirl said. “They're watching us.”

“He doesn't count,” Impactor said. “He's not Cybertronian.”

“Were you listening to Legs? He's from the Ark. He's an antique, but he's still one of us.”

“I don't care what he is,” Skids said. “He's rabid and we need to put him down before he murders us all. For Orion.”

 _Not good, not good._ Whirl could take Skids any day, easy. Impactor was a toughie, but as long as he stayed out of range he could manage. But he wasn't normally having this much trouble standing upright. The crane was already lifting Cyclonus's body over the edge of the cage wall, there wasn't _time_ to think of an alternate strategy.

The magnet released Cyclonus and Whirl dove to cover him. “Stay the hell back!” he yelled at the two belligerent idiots, waving his good claw at them threateningly. “You're not getting to him without going through me and _you know what happens if you try._ ”

He felt ridiculous. He _looked_ ridiculous. He'd been right—he was taller than Cyclonus. But Cyclonus was sturdier and crouching over him without Whirl's cockpit getting in the way was awkward as fuck.

The two would-be vengeance seekers sneered at him. “Come on, Skids,” Impactor said. “He can't stay like that forever.  It's not worth it.” _Thank you, Drillbit._ Once their heads cooled they'd get over the idea.

In the meantime, Whirl was stuck like this. The smell of congealing energon hit his chemo-sensors in waves. Cyclonus looked like a mechanimal, fuel coating his chin and splashed down his front. Gross. Whirl spent the time imagining all the things a mech could rip through with fangs like that (a lot), watching the Troublesome Two out of the corner of his optic, and hoping Cyclonus wouldn't wake up.

Eventually his leg started cramping up on him and he crawled off, pushing his charge towards the wall by the gate and positioning himself in front of him. Skids and Impactor glared. Whirl made a rude gesture with his claw and settled in to wait. And people said he wasn't patient. Whirl was very patient. The trick to never being bored was to have a helm full of thoughts and Whirl had never been lacking for that. The trouble was just getting them to organize themselves in a useful order.

Eventually, someone showed up. Inevitably, it was the other four members of the Orion Pax fanclub—the Maxes had served with him in the Primal Vanguard and the Outliers...they knew him from somewhere way back. Whirl didn't like his odds against six.

Luckily, they were accompanied by Dai Atlas, who was back to walking on two legs again. Whirl saw his chance.

“Yo, Sir Swords-A-Lot. Could you please explain to the rest of these idiots that they can't touch our newly assigned roommate?” He jerked his claw behind him to point at Cyclonus.

Dai Atlas looked at him, then at Cyclonus and then, taking his sweet dang time about it, over at the Orion Pax Fan Club. “Ah,” he said insightfully.

Big and Pointy walked over, right up into Whirl's space. He didn’t touch the Great Sword sheathed on his back. Course, he wouldn’t need to. Whirl didn't bother trying to look threatening—they'd had too many matches against each other for him to fool Dai Atlas. He peered over Whirl's shoulder, scrutinizing Cyclonus.

“You should go to the medstation,” he said at last. “Someone should look at that claw.”

“I'm not leaving him.”

“I will watch him,” Dai Atlas said. “You are right, for once.” He pitched his voice louder, so it carried to their faux-unconcerned audience. “This is a trap. They are attempting to trick you into stepping outside the lines so that we are punished. You are all too smart to fall for it.”

Which was the same dang thing Whirl had said, but somehow it got the crew of them inspecting the tops of their feet and looking away shamefaced. That was the kind of respect you got when you owned a ancient sword.

“I'll stay here just the same,” Whirl said. “I'm fine.”

“Tailgate is coming up to get you in a moment,” Dai Atlas said. “And Thunderclash won't be up until Orion's surgery is complete. I will watch him—you have my word that no one will touch him while you're gone.” He touched two fingers lightly to his chestplate and Whirl gave in.

He let Tailgate take him to the medibay at the bottom of the elevator. Then he sent Tailgate off to look in on Orion while he faced the Consortium's surgeon. By the time he was released out into the recovery room, he'd made up his mind. He was going to fight Cyclonus.

“Yo, how's Big Blue?” He asked, sauntering over to Orion's berth. Thunderclash was at his side, deep in conversation with his hands folded softly over Orion's claw. They looked over as Whirl approached.

“He'll recover,” Thunders said shortly.

“Mind if me and Blue have a chat? A little spark-to-spark? There's something I need to talk to him about...” he looked around, “Where's Legs?”

“Tailgate went back up,” Orion rattled. Damn, he sounded awful. Natural consequence of getting your throat torn out, probably. They'd done a pretty good patch job on him, Whirl wouldn't have guessed he'd been leaking like a burst pipe a few hours earlier. “Thunderclash? Could you give us a little space?”

Thunderclash didn't approve, Whirl could tell, but he went anyway.

“What do you want?” Orion asked. Good. Good. He wasn't going to ask about Whirl shouting encouragement to his opponent. Whirl really had no idea what to say about that.

“I want to fight Cyclonus.”

“Cyclonus?” Orion's optic furrowed in confusion.

“The one who did this to you.”

“Oh.” Orion waved him over to the seat beside the berth. “Why are you asking me? I'm not in charge of anything, Whirl.”

Whirl sat down. “You're not in charge, but every mech up there would listen to you. I figure next time will go about the same as this time—last mech standing fights Hornhead. So I need to be the last mech standing.”

“Aren't you...oh, what was it you said? “Super-unvincible?” What do you need my help for?”

“We don't have to play,” Whirl said. “I could beat any of y'all, but I wouldn't be able to make a showing against Cyclonus afterwards. So I need whoever faces me to take it easy.”

Orion hummed. “I wasn't sure you were capable of sincerity. Why this fight?”

“You saw him. He's a monster. He's fucking savage. Not one of you fraggers is brave enough to kill me, but he could do it.” Whirl looked him in the optic. “I want out.”

Orion looked him over in silence, like the secrets of the universe were hidden somewhere in his scarred claws and battered plating. “You know why we can't.”

“But _he_ can. He's not part of this.”

Orion looked away. “It won't be easy to convince them, you've done too good a job of making enemies. I'll do it—if you do me a favor.” He lifted a hand to his chestplate, unlatching it and sliding his hand inside. He drew out a ragged cable, bits of wire fraying at one end. He held it out to Whirl.

“Is that...contraband?” Whirl asked gleefully.

“It's a direct link-up cable. It doesn't work any more. You were a craftsman once, right? Fix it and I'll fix the fight.”

“What do you want a direct link-up cable for?” Whirl asked, taking it in his claws. _How the frag was he supposed to fix this delicate little thing without fingers? Or supplies? But damn him if he was going to back down from the challenge._

“What's it matter to you?” Orion asked, letting his optic dim in exhaustion. “If everything works out, you won't be alive for that part.”

 

* * *

 

He did it, but it wasn't easy. For one thing, to stay in reach of the equipment he needed, he had to actually stay in the recovery room for the next two days. Tailgate took that as an admission that he was seriously hurt and hovered like a—well, like a helicopter. Thunderclash disapproved in silence and Orion kept staring at him in pity as Whirl struggled to manipulate a pair of tiny forceps with his claws. Ultimately he had to tape the cable to the countertop to stop it from running away from him while he was trying to work. He hoped this wasn't some “moral lesson“ about how empurata wasn't “that bad“ and that he could still do things with his claws. He was lucky Orion hadn't asked him to fix anything more complicated than a transfer cable.

It would have been easier if he wasn't so jittery with excitement.

Tailgate could tell he was up to something but Whirl was too clever to tell him what. He distracted him with whatever nonsense his brain could cook up and spilled loquacious over all of Tailgate's attempts to change the subject. He wasn't _fooling_ him, but...like Orion said, it wouldn't matter in the long run.

When he made it back topside, he was surprised to find Cyclonus was awake. Which was silly. Of course he was awake. If he hadn't woken up after _days_ that would probably have been because he was dead and then he wouldn't have been any use to Whirl at all. So: awake: not as much of a surprise as he'd thought at first.

He was right where Whirl had left him, legs folded over one another like Dai Atlas during his meditation, hands resting loosely in his lap. His optics were lit and lazily watching everyone in the cage like a cyberlynx surveying its choice of prey. Dai Atlas was still positioned between Cyclonus and the rest of them, but his posture had shifted from guarding _Cyclonus_ to guarding _everyone else_. Whirl joined him.

“Any excitement? I miss anything good?” he asked.

“It has been uneventful,” Dai Atlas said. “I have not gotten Cyclonus to respond to me.”

“Cyclonus? You been talking to Legs? He'd recognized the hornhead.”

Dai Atlas glanced over at him, unimpressed. “Tailgate is not the only person here who was alive for the time before the Ark. I knew Cyclonus then.” He sighed and looked over at the mech, welmish grey still splattered with pink. Dai Atlas corrected himself. “I knew of him.”

“So who was he? I mean, he was on the Ark, so clearly he was some hot shot prince or scholar or warlord or some slag.”

“He was Lord Galvatron's bodyguard, his Warrior Secondus.” Dai Atlas explained. “It's hard to imagine that he would have been found without his lord.”

“Maybe Galvatron died?” Whirl suggested. That _was_ hard to picture. Whirl wasn't a complete ignoramus, he'd heard of Lord Galvatron. He'd survived the war of the Thirteen Primes, Whirl didn't fancy meeting whatever it was out in space that could have done him in.

“It is the duty of a Warrior Secondus to _die_ for one's lord,” Dai Atlas said. He frowned. “Though that warrior's code was falling out of favor even when the Ark departed.”

“Hmm. Sounds fragged up,” Whirl commented, and didn't ask more. He didn't need to know Cyclonus's tragic backstory, he needed him to tear his throat out. Better to keep things simple.

Orion was back topside not long after and was immediately mobbed by huddles of the Orion Pax fan club. Whirl watched Cyclonus for any reaction, but he just sat there. Like he'd been cast out of bronze instead of living metal.

Whirl thought maybe Cyclonus was watching _him_. Every time he looked over—which wasn't often, thank you very much, he had things to do—he seemed to find Cyclonus's bright red optics boring a hole through him. That was one of those phrases Whirl had never understood before—he thought maybe people just said it because it sounded poetical and shit, but Cyclonus really did look like he was trying to dig into you with his optics. What a weirdo.

But yeah, Whirl had better things to do than ponder the inner nature of his hopefully soon-to-be arch-nemesis and downfall:

1\. He practiced a couple of _excellent_ last words under his breath. He was going to nail this.  
2\. He was going to learn how to do a backwards 360 with a scissor kick in the middle because that would be a dang cool move. Nobody liked Whirl practicing in the cage, because the chains holding it up tended to rock when he made his incredibly graceful landings. Which—sucks to be them, where else was he going to practice?  
3\. He waffled over whether there was anything he should tell Tailgate before the fight. He was leaning towards no.

Time was...weird, in the cage. You'd think there would be fights every few nights but by Whirl's chronometer the timing seemed completely random. It was probably synched up to broadcast times in some Black Box Consortia planet but he was damned if he could figure out the pattern. The first warning they got was Tailgate getting a buzz.

Not like that. Obviously nobody was sneaking circuit speeders into the cage—Whirl didn't even know how Orion had gotten that neural linkup cable. Tailgate had cuffs, just like the rest of them. Only his weren't inhibitor cuffs (no internal weaponry or weird outlier powers to inhibit) they were a pager system.

Anyway, Tailgate's arm started buzzing and—same as ever—he jumped about three feet in the air before scurrying off to the elevator to start readying the medibay. The Consortia hadn't wanted Tailgate, but they made good use of him.

Tailgate had been gone for a while when Impactor came up to him. “So, birdbrain, I heard you wanna fight the freak.”

“What about it?” Whirl asked, crossing his arms.

“You got a death wish? I mean, I'll go for it—you'd be a lot less annoying as a corpse. But I thought you and freaky-eyes over there were buddies.”

“That's clever,” Whirl said sweetly.  He pointed over at Skids. “Did Bigfoot think of it for you?”

Impactor snorted and walked away. Whirl waved him off with a little wiggle of his claws. Good riddance.

 

* * *

 

Finally, the Primus-damned fights started. First matchup was Maximus v Maximus, which Pious won handily. Next up was Windcharger and Trailcutter tag-teaming a pair of organic soldiers—they loosed the outliers powers during matches, but almost always set poor Windcharger against opponents without anything metallic on them.

Next Soundwave and Dai Atlas fought, a matchup that contained shockingly little action. They just circled each other like gears in a chronometer, sizing each other up until at last they lunged. Dai Atlas went down like a sack of bricks—they both fought dirty, playing for sensornet damage and pressure points.

Finally, Whirl was loosed on the field, paired up against Pious Maximus. Normally he'd have had a good time pinwheeling about, irritating the ever-loving-slag out of poor Pious before the brute managed to catch him and squash him. This time Pious gave him a little nod before the fight started and Whirl knew he was going to win. When he did, Pious offered him a hand to shake.

And then Whirl was left on the floor with Soundwave. On your average night he'd have been shaking in his plating—Soundwave fought _dirty_ —but he'd seen him over the past few days all cuddled up with Orion at the center of the Orion Pax Fan Club. And sure enough, Soundwave gave him a few openings you could have driven a convoy through. Whirl took the gift.

Finally, the laser grid came down to hold him back as his monster was lowered from the cage above. Whirl was buzzing with excitement.

When the crane dropped him, Cyclonus landed in a low crouch. He stood slowly, tossing his head back. His jaw dropped open, optics lidded as he breathed in the taste of the battlefield. Then his optics flared bright, honing in on Whirl as he continued to take deep breaths of the air thick with fuel and ash. Above them, the announcer was blathering on. Cyclonus licked his lips.

The start signal blared and the laser grid fell away. Whirl rushed Cyclonus, but darted left when Cyclonus made no move to counter. He spent the momentum in a roll, catching himself just before the ledge out onto the smelting pool. He looked over his shoulder. Cyclonus was still there, deathly grey face watching him with a peculiar smile.

“Well, don't just stand there,” Whirl said, waving his claw. “This is a fight.”

Cyclonus smiled wider and just crooked one talon at Whirl, inviting him to try again.

Whirl roared and took to the air, spiraling up around Cyclonus in a dizzying rush. He wasn't going to be _mocked_ by a mech who looked halfway past half-dead. He swooped out of the spiral to aim a rotor at the back of Cyclonus's neck.

With preternatural speed, a clawed hand whipped up to grab his wrist and throw him to the floor. The impact jarred him halfway through his transformation and his t-cog struggled to re-initiate the transition as Cyclonus stalked towards him. He grabbed Whirl by the shoulders and flipped him to face the floor before dragging his arms into a lock back behind him. Whirl thrashed against him and Cyclonus dropped to kneel across his back— _damn_ he was heavy. Whirl had a head on him but he was all lightweight frame, there was no way he was going to be able to throw him off.

“Get the frag off me and fight!” He shouted, pulling his straining arms against the lock. With difficulty, he twisted his neck to glare at Cyclonus.

Cyclonus stared at him...frag, “hungrily“ was definitely the word Whirl was looking for. He growled something unintelligible, a grinding sound Whirl recognized as a failing vocalizer. An empty, Pious had called him. Whirl's mind flashed to the gory scene with Orion in the ring.

Fangs brushed over the back of his neck and he shuddered. Languidly, they pressed against one of of the fuel lines, bringing energon bubbling free. Whirl waited for the tearing to follow. It didn't come. Cyclonus latched onto the back of his neck, suckling at the flow of fuel, lips warm on his plating.

“Oh, I get it. You’re a no-honor siphonist,” Whirl said. “Here I thought I was fighting a freaking ancient warrior but you're just a little—” he heaved, trying to throw Cyclonus off him, “a glitch-spawned guttermech.”

Cyclonus made a sound that sounded way too much like a derisive snort to be an accident. Above them, Whirl could hear his “friends“ jeering. No fragging loyalty. “Come on!” He said. “Fight me or kill me, do _something_.”

Cyclonus pulled away, brushing his lips gently over the puncture marks as he went. “I do not intend to do either, little bird.” His voice was deep, like molten steel and just as warm. He had the weirdest enunciation Whirl had ever heard.

“Kill me,” Whirl hissed. “Do it, you coward.”

“No.”

Cyclonus dropped him and stepped away. Whirl took the opportunity to scramble to his feet. His head was pounding, vision blurring a little as he took in Cyclonus facing him across the ring.

He was resplendent, plating deepening to purple as the grey of death receded. Whirl hadn't thought his optics were dim before, but now they glowed red like a half-forged blade. His lips were still pink with Whirl's fuel.

“Fight me!” Whirl roared, charging the mech again. He expected the ferocious grace of Cyclonus's earlier attack, but the mech just stepped away from him. And then again. And again. Cyclonus practically danced away from his strikes, that damned smile never leaving his face.

“I will not hurt you,” Cyclonus said, ducking under Whirl's arm to spin away from him again.

“Do you know where you are?” Whirl asked. He waved his arms at the ring and the encircling smelting pool, the black walls that reached up to the dazzling lights and the cage that hung above them. “That's the only thing that happens here!”

“That is not true,” Cyclonus said. “You protected me.”

“Only because those slagheads were going to get us all in trouble!” Whirl waved his claw dismissively. “I don't give a shit about you. So stop talking and fight me!”

Cyclonus pounced, catching Whirl around the waist and pulling him close to murmur in his audial. “If you did not care why did you call out my name?”

“Aaagh!” Whirl threw his elbow into Cyclonus's face and pulled away. He spun around and shouted. “I don't know! I don't know why I do anything!”

Cyclonus reached one clawed hand up to  his nose, where fuel was leaking out across his face. He licked the fuel off his fingers with a deliberate nonchalance. “If you say so. Let us dance, little bird.”

And then he jumped into his transformation. He _was_ a jet—Whirl had always been good at guessing aerialists. Whirl took off after him.

It was more of the same—Whirl trying to land a hit, anything to goad Cyclonus into fighting back, Cyclonus dancing around him through the air as if this was some kind of game. The announcer above began to shout things Whirl couldn't understand—didn't need to understand.

“They're getting impatient!” Whirl shouted over the roar of engines.

Cyclonus didn't respond, just looped up towards the cage. Whirl realized a moment too late that he wasn't going to bank away in time.

Cyclonus hit the energy net in jet mode, but the force of the shock triggered his transformation cog. He fell in root mode, a dead weight plummeting towards the floor of the ring. Whirl cursed.

“You idiot,” he muttered, not sure if he was talking about himself or about Cyclonus. Then he dove to catch him.

They landed in a cloud of dust, old fuel and rust thrown airborne by the collision. _There was no way he could have known that was there..._ But throwing himself against the net had most certainly ended the fight. Frag, maybe Whirl had found the only mech more stupidly stubborn than himself in the entire galaxy.

<<Stand down>> a voice echoed over the loudspeaker in stilted Cybertronian. The recording repeated itself as the trapdoor into the space below opened up and grey powersuit-clad jailers swarmed the floor. They grabbed Whirl and pulled him to the edge of the ring where the laser grid reactivated, trapping him in place.

<<Match lost by forfeit.>> The voice announced.

They dragged Cyclonus to his knees, plating still crackling with sparks. One of the jailers approached and lifted off their helmet. Underneath, their soft and doughy flesh was twisted in an odd smile. “I thought we'd tamed you, freak,” he said.

Cyclonus snorted. “Death did not tame me. I would like to see you try.”

“You will fight, here or on the battlefield,” he said. “Or I will let my men avenge their friends and strip you down to parts.”

Cyclonus just stared right through him.

“Right. Well.” The guard waved two of his companions over and reached down to his side to draw a blade that hummed to life with a crackle of green light.

The guards took Cyclonus by the horns and braced themselves as the one with the blade set its edge to the base of his horn. Sparks flew and Cyclonus swallowed a painful noise before setting his jaw.

The guard ripped the horn free and walked over to the edge of the ring. Not breaking eye contact, he dropped the horn into the smelting pool, where it bobbed for a moment before sinking into the heat. The guard pointed his knife at Cyclonus. “Next time you will _fight_ or I'll be forced to cut off something more essential.”

The crane came down and lifted Whirl away and he missed whatever else the guards said before they scurried back down into their hole.

He wasn't in that bad of shape, really. Nothing broken, nothing busted. The worst was the pounding in his head from the low fuel pressure but even that wasn't so bad. He'd been hungrier in the Functionists’ prison.

“What the hell was that?” Impactor asked as Whirl pulled himself to his feet.

“No fucking clue,” Whirl said. “They taking him up?”

“Yeah,” Skids said.

“Where's Legs?” Whirl asked, looking around. There he was—face pressed to the  cage wall, watching the crane lift Cyclonus up. Whirl sauntered over and poked him on the shoulder, startling the little mech out of his reverie. “Legs! Leggy! I was looking for you.”

“Hi Whirl,” Tailgate said distractedly. “Glad you're okay.”

“Can't say I am but let's ignore that. I need you to pop the elevator door open so me and Hornhead can take a little trip.”

“Down to the medibay?” Tailgate asked, already scooting towards the gate. As part of his role of general minder and keeper of the prisoners, Tailgate was the only one who could open up the gate that blocked the way to the elevators.

“Nah, I was planning on hitting the washracks.” Whirl said, jerking his claw over his shoulder towards the ring. “I'll take him down with me.”

“Are you sure that's safe?” Tailgate asked.

“Tough mech like me? I'll be fine.” Whirl tapped his claws together impatiently. “Come on, Leggsies, I just need a little bit of—” he looked side to side in exaggerated paranoia, “privacy.”

“O-kay,” Tailgate said dubiously. “But only after I check that he doesn't need to go to the medibay.”

They waited together for the crane to finally drop Cyclonus. He landed poorly and didn't bother to get up. The atmosphere of the cage had changed, Whirl decided. The other prisoners didn't look nearly as hostile. Maybe him humiliating Whirl had done something for his reputation.

“Hey, Cyclonus?” Tailgate asked, kneeling over.

He looked up at Tailgate with a baleful stare. Whirl stepped up next to Tailgate, ready to handle any trouble. Not that he was expecting much excitement—last time he’d been zapped by the energy grid he'd spent the next few days scooting around on his aft because he couldn't get his legs to work.

“Do you need to go down to the medibay? We could get that fixed for you,” Tailgate suggested, pointing at the severed horn.

Cyclonus glared harder. “No,” he said, retreating towards monosyllabism.

“Good. Cool.” Whirl said. “That's fine, because me and Pointy here have an appointment downstairs. Come on Tailgate, let's go.”

“If you're sure...” Tailgate said, pouting at Cyclonus.

Whirl crouched down next to Cyclonus. “Hey, I'm going to pick you up. Don't bite me.”

Responding to that was apparently beneath his dignity. Fine by Whirl. He got one claw under each arm and pulled Cyclonus to “standing“, then walked them backwards to the gate. Tailgate skipped ahead to get the door. Whirl pushed the button that _didn’t_ lead to the medibay and down they went. He gave Tailgate a jaunty wave as the doors closed.

“Where are we going?” Cyclonus asked. Conversationally, like they were standing in line at an oilshop, not in a unlit elevator in a bloodsports space prison.

“There's a washrack downstairs, good place to get some privacy,” Whirl said.

“It isn't under surveillance?”

“I’ve only seen cameras in the arena,” Whirl said. “And they don't really care _what_ we say. Not like we're going anywhere. As long as we get in the ring and fight, that's all they care about. I meant privacy from the rest of those losers.”

Cyclonus hummed in response. The doors opened on the sterile white of the washracks and Whirl dragged him in. He deposited Cyclonus on one of the benches the lined the wall and hesitated, trying to decide where he wanted to start. He had questions. He had a lot of questions. But Cyclonus didn't seem like the talkative sort, so it was important to get those questions in the right order so  he actually got answers to the things he was _most_ curious about. Unfortunately, this was exactly the sort of slag his brain was worst at.

“So, I guess you're probably curious why I dragged you down here,” Whirl started, stalling for time.

“Not especially,” Cyclonus said. He leaned his head back against the wall and stared tiredly up at Whirl. “But you'll have to come closer for that.”

Whirl shook his head. “What for?” Oh frag, hopefully Cyclonus didn't think Whirl was trying to kill him? That was no good. Or maybe he thought Whirl was still on about getting Cyclonus to kill _him_ —well, he wouldn't complain if that was the case. Whirl perched himself on the bench next to Cyclonus, folding one leg over the other in an attempt to look casual. “Like this?” He asked.

“Much better,” Cyclonus purred, voice dipping back down into that strut-melting rumble. He leaned over and kissed the side of Whirl's neck.

“Woah.” Whirl scooted to safety and got a claw between them to hold Cyclonus back. “No more siphoning. My fuel is all well and good where it is, thank you very much.”

Cyclonus stared at him, obviously baffled. “I wasn't going to _bite_ you,” he said.

“Then what the frag were you doing?”

Cyclonus blinked at him. “Kissing you?”

Whirl snorted. “And why the frag would you do _that_?”

“That's why we're here?”

“And how exactly did you figure that? We are not friends, by the way. I don't have friends and I definitely do not have _kissing_ friends,” Whirl said with a nod of his head. “Sounds mushy.”

Cyclonus snorted. “We're not friends. But what warrior does not seek the embrace of their fellow after another battle survived, another day won?”

“...I gotta admit, I've been picturing ancient culture all wrong. You mean to tell me that during the War of the Thirteen Primes soldiers were all getting handsy and macking on each other?”

“If that's not why you brought me here, what did you want?”

“Questions. I have questions. And power to Primus, now I have even _more_ questions.” Whirl hopped off the bench and paced over to the other side of the washracks where they kept the detailing kits. “Okay, Whirl, prioritize,” he muttered. “What's the important stuff?”

He picked up one of the kits and walked back over. “Okay. Yeah, like I said. I have questions. Question number one: let’s keep things broad, what in Primus's name happened to you and how did you get here?”

Cyclonus rubbed at the dried energon where it had crusted on his face. Against his newly purple plating it was harder to see the mess of it dried onto his neck and chest, still there from when he'd nearly killed Orion Pax. “That's a long story and, as you said, we are not friends. I'd want something in exchange for its telling.”

“What?”

Cyclonus smiled, sharklike. “Two things. The first is that you let me kiss you again. And then I want to know who mutilated you, and why.”

“Mutilated...oh, scrap, you are _ancient_. Uh, I guess I'll ignore that first part for now. Do you know how long you were lost in space?”

“My chrono tells me it has been four million years,” Cyclonus said. He set his jaw. “It felt like eternity.”

“Cool, cool. Well, while you and the rest of the Ark were gone the government started getting real uppity about who was allowed to do what. If you decided you didn't want to do the job your alt mode “destined“ you to do, they didn't like that very much. And people they didn't like very much ended up like me.” He snipped his claws. “Empurata, they called it. Marks you as untouchable.”

“The government did this?”

“On a scale, mate. Me and Big Blue are old school empurata, from back when the Senate still had sway. They mutilated so many folks that people stopped caring.”

Cyclonus stared at him, as if hunting for some sign of truth in his optic. Whirl just shrugged. “How do you think me and the rest of them ended up here? The Council sold us out to the Consortia.”

“The government sold her citizens for the entertainment of another empire?” Cyclonus asked, feeling out the words.

“We were just taking up space in the prisons, mostly, not like anyone wanted us. Probably a win-win from the Council's perspective. Ugly problems disposed of, bargaining chip with the Consortia.”

“I do not know if I would want to see that Cybertron,” Cyclonus said grimly.

“Why do you think I wanted you to kill me?”

Cyclonus ignored him. “My kiss and then I will answer your question.”

“I really don't see the appeal. For one thing, I don't have really, you know, a face. Essential component of kissing, I've been told. Or hands. Those are also useful.”

“Come here,” Cyclonus ordered.

“Sheesh, bossy.” Whirl grumbled. He thought for a moment about how to be most obnoxious about following through on that request and decided to sit on Cyclonus's lap, throwing his arms around his neck and bumping their helms together. “There you go, lover boy. Do your worst.”

Cyclonus let his arms loop around Whirl's waist and leaned forward, pushing their helms together. He held tight for a long moment. Not a lover's embrace or a mocking thing—Whirl could feel barely-restrained desperation in his arms, could tell when Cyclonus forced himself to relax them and pulled back to plant a gentle, grateful, kiss on the side of Whirl's helm.

“Thank you,” he said, voice rough. He lifted a clawed hand to cradle Whirl's face, such as it was.

“So, story time?” Whirl asked.

Cyclonus let his hand fall back to the bench. He looked out over Whirl's shoulder, face hardening back into a thing of stone. “I did not want to leave Cybertron. But my lord was venturing on the Ark, so I went. We were barely a year into our journey when we found...a thing. A fissure from our world to someplace else.”

“I did not want us to go through. But the desires of a Warrior Second is nothing to the whims of a Prime, so we went. And, like vermin caught in a trap, we found there was no way back through from the other side.”

As he spoke, his voice deepened into a cadence that was almost a poem, like he'd spent years narrowing down this story to its barest details, crafting it like a song of Old. Of course, Cyclonus was old as ore. Maybe this was how everyone told stories back in the day.

“We found a dead world. In all the planets we visited, there was no life. No light. No stars. No escape.” Cyclonus shuddered. “The fuel in our ship grew short and then ran dry. And then the crew began to die.”

Whirl narrowed his optic. “What killed them?”

Cyclonus flicked his gaze over to him. “I don't know. They just...ran cold. Every day they grew weaker, grew colder, until one day they did not get up again. They all succumbed. Our Prime. My Lord. My friend. I was left the only survivor.”

“Why didn't you die?”

Cyclonus shook his head. “I do not know. Scourge said...” his voice trailed off. “My friend, Scourge, said that perhaps Primus had intervened on my behalf. But I cannot believe that. I prayed to Primus for deliverance in the years to follow and none came.”

“Wait, so you just stayed on a ship full of dead bodies, for, what, millions of years?”

“Hundreds of years.” Cyclonus tightened his arms around Whirl's waist. “I say that I _did_ not die, but it would be more proper to say I could not die. I felt stretched thin, some half thing between life and death. And I grew hungry.” He ducked his face again in shame. “When I felt I could no longer resist temptation, I surrendered myself to space.”

Whirl almost asked what the frag he meant, but his brain caught up with him just in time. Gross. Whirl had been hungry, in times past. He'd been hungry enough that he'd scavenged vermin from the alleyways in Iacon, that he'd looked with envy on the roaming siphonists. He'd never felt tempted to crack open a dead body for the congealed energon left within. And certainly not anyone he _knew_.

“I drifted away from the ship,” Cyclonus said in a dull monotone. “There were no stars there, no source of heat. I froze and still did not have the release of death.”

“Damn,” Whirl said. “That sucks.”

Cyclonus laughed, startled. He looked back up at Whirl with what looked like wonder in his eyes. “It did,” he agreed.

“So how did you get back to this...universe?” Whirl asked.

“I do not know,” Cyclonus admitted. “I was already on board the Consortium ship when they thawed me out. From then until you called to me in the ring everything is a haze of hunger.”

“So you don't know what that guard was talking about in the ring?”

Cyclonus shrugged. “I remember pain. I assume he was my torturer, but the details are hard to piece together. It is of no matter.”

“No matter?” Whirl bopped him on the helm. “You've got to get your brain off of geologic time, mate. Focus on the immediate. You're a prisoner just like the rest of us now. That guy was right—when they say “fight“ you have to fight. Well, they don't usually “say“ fight. But it's implied.”

“I have told you, I have no interest in fighting anyone.” Cyclonus said.

“Well, why'd you rip out Orion's throat then?” Whirl asked.

Cyclonus winced. “I was not...myself. I lost control. It will not happen again.”

“Cool, cool. Only, you _have_ to fight.”

“I will happily kill any of our captors if the opportunity presents itself. I have no quarrel with the rest of you.”

“Well, if you don't, you're not the only person who's going to be in trouble,” Whirls snapped. “Why do you think the rest of us fight? Do you think we're idiots? Cowards?”

Cyclonus frowned. “Are they entirely without honor?”

“ _Yes_ ,” Whirl hissed. “Why do you think I'm still here? If I offed myself, they'd take that out on the ones who are left.”

“You thought to use me,” Cyclonus mused. “You thought I was beyond reason and hoped that I would see you into the Afterspark.”

“It was a great plan, if someone would have cooperated,” Whirl grumbled. “Don't know why you didn't.”

“I didn't know you, but I knew you had protected me,” Cyclonus said. “So we are condemned to the Pits, then, without chance of escape or rebellion?”

“Hey, if you want to be cheered up, you should talk to someone else. Maybe Tailgate, he's good at looking on the bright side of things.”

“I see.” Cyclonus thought it over. “I will fight, then, on one condition.”

“And what is that?” Whirl asked. He realized abruptly, that he was still sitting on Cyclonus's lap and that they wouldn't have much more time before Tailgate came down to look for them. Whirl stood up and went to actually wash off.

“For each fight, I would like to kiss you,” Cyclonus said.

“And why the hell would you want to do that?” Whirl asked, waving the sprayer in one hand.

“Does it matter why?” Cyclonus asked.

“Not really,” Whirl said. “Heck. Sure. Why not. No telling the others though, I don't want them to think I've gone soft.”

 

* * *

 

 

“Hey losers, this is Cyclonus of...don't tell me,” Whirl said. throwing his arm over Cyclonus's shoulder.

“Tetrahex,” Cyclonus rumbled.

“I just said not to tell me, Hornhead!”

The rest of the cage eyed them warily. Cyclonus dipped his head minutely, but didn't say anything else.

“Anyway, I gave Goblinface the talk and he promises that he'll toe the line from here on out.”

“Do you call anyone by their name?” Cyclonus asked, slipping under Whirl's arm and walking back to the wall of the cage away from everyone else.

“Nah. You call someone by their name and they might get the misapprehension that I care about them. I'd hate to confuse people like that.”

“Cyclonus,” Dai Atlas called.

Cyclonus froze, and looked back over his shoulder. “Dai Atlas.”

“The others, are they...”

“Dead.” Cyclonus confirmed.

“How did you survive?”

“Sometimes, even Primus makes mistakes,” Cyclonus said.

 

* * *

 

Whirl reached out and touched the current of sparks, sending it swirling as the motes and cinders rode on the warm draft wafting up from the smelting pool. They were too small to burn, the sensation on his claws ticklish. It wasn’t a fight so the stage lights were off, everyone lit only by the pink of the smelting pool down below. In the dim you could see the sparks better.

“What are you doing up there?”

Whirl jammed his foot a little farther in the spaces of the fence and then let go of the top rail, flipping over backwards to bring himself face to face with a stolidly disapproving Cyclonus. Whirl crossed his arms to mirror him.

“What does it look like I'm doing?” he asked.

“Climbing the walls,” Cyclonus said.

“Well, there you go,” Whirl said. “That's exactly what I'm doing.” With a terrific heave he swung himself back upright and caught the upper edge of the cage.

“Why?” Cyclonus asked.

“Nothing else to do around here,” Whirl said. There was no point in getting into the sotto voce nastiness with the Orion Pax fanclub earlier. They didn't like Whirl, well, that was mutual. Nobody seemed to be harboring a grudge against Cyclonus and him sticking his nose into things wasn’t going to do anyone any favors.

Cyclonus didn't say anything and Whirl figured the conversation was over until the rattling of the cage made him peek over his shoulder. Cyclonus pulled himself up to the top and hooked his elbows over the edge. “I suppose the view is more appealing up here,” he said mildly.

“Look, I don't wanna be rude, but who invited you to come on up?”

Cyclonus looked sidelong at him. “Is this _your_ fence, then?”

“Mm,” Whirl reached over and poked a especially bright ember, breaking it into fragments. “I suppose not. You looking for me for something?”

“I have been wondering something,” Cyclonus looked around the cage. “It's about the little one.”

“Tailgate,” Whirl said. He peeked over his shoulder—no sign of the minibot. “He's probably downstairs cleaning the washracks or doing inventory in the medibay or something. They keep him busy.”

“Why is he here?” Cyclonus asked. “He does not...fit.”

“Oh, well, that's a long story. Tailgate's a janitor bot. Not as old as you but way older than me. He was supposed to do some sort of work on the Ark before it launched, but he tried to take a shortcut and broke through the Mitteous Plateau. Took a while to get back out and when he did the council had him arrested for dereliction of duty. He was in jail when the Functionists took over, so they just sorta...assigned him to doing janitorial work at The Hub. That was the prison most of us chumps came outta.”

Whirl waved a hand at the crowd down below them. “Well, there were more of us at first. They didn't institute the “no killing“ rule right away. Yeah, so, when the Functionists sold us here, I think someone there tried to get cute. They sent a janitor along with their trash.”

“They sent him here as a joke?”

Whirl shrugged. “The Consortia didn't want him, but they realized it could make use of him. At least they don't send him out on fights. That would have gotten everybody up in arms—can you imagine?”

“I do not intend to,” Cyclonus said, leaning his chin on his folded arms. Whirl scrambled to think of something to change the subject to.

“So, your, horn. You keeping it like that? Very fierce,” Whirl said, pointing at the ragged stump. “Because if you don't want to go to the medic downstairs, Tailgate could probably scrounge the supplies to cast you a replacement.”

Cyclonus flicked his optics over in what Whirl decided to read as amusement. “I did not get the impression you cared.”

“I mean, I’m not a bleeding spark, I’m just nosy.”

“If you say so.” Cyclonus reached one of his hands out for the wafting sparks, shuttering his optics. The sparks swirled like dust motes caught in sunlight and Whirl thought he caught a tiny smile as Cyclonus pulled his hand back through. “When Primus sets obstacles in your path, they are to be worked _through_ , not around. Battle scars are signs of his blessing, that he has set many obstacles in your way and yet you have survived.”

“You come on this religious conviction recently? Because you’re dang sparkly for an old warrior who doesn’t believe in fixing slag.”

“I have not recently been at the liberty to decide what repairs were needful,” Cyclonus said.

“Oh, right.”

The chain-link wall shook and Whirl had to grab for the top or topple. “Hey!” he yelled.

“Hey yourself,” Impactor said. “Get down, freak squad, you’re going to get us all in trouble.”

“They like that I’m a wildcard, actually,” Whirl informed his retreating back. “I’m a ratings miracle.”

“Do they really?” Cyclonus asked.

“I’m still alive, aren’t I?”

 

* * *

 

 

Whirl shook his helm, splattering fuel on the floor of the ring. He squinted up at Cyclonus, watching from up in the cage. The bastard licked his lips.

“Frag you!” Whirl slurred, rounding on Turmoil and preparing to get pounded into the rust again.

 

* * *

 

 

There was a rattle from above the cell and Whirl snapped to alertness. He bounded onto his feet and danced a bit, snapping his claws in excitement. “Dinner time!” He crowed, rousing the rest of them from their slack-jawed distraction.

The Maximus boys got on their feet first, followed by the the Orion Pax fan club. Orion was still tangled up with Soundwave—the direct transfer cable hooked up between their helms. They'd gotten _real_ close since the last fight, but nobody was giving them slag about it because, well, it was Orion. Thunderclash and Dai Atlas stopped their game of fullstasis and even Turmoil pushed himself to his feet.

Tailgate bounded over to Whirl, throwing his arms wide. “Give me a boost!” he said, already jumping. Whirl tossed him up onto his shoulders so that Tailgate could reach the recharge station as it lowered itself into the cage.

It was a big circular thing, recharge cables and fueling lines encircling its outer edge. Tailgate worked his way around, balanced on Whirl's shoulders and still barely able to reach, passing a recharge cable and fuel line to each bot in turn. When they got to the end of the line, Whirl took a pair of each and walked them over to Cyclonus.

“So do you _only_ refuel by biting people or do you know how to recharge like a civilized mech?” Whirl asked, passing them over.

“Whirl!” Tailgate admonished, climbing down his back to help Cyclonus.

Cyclonus tried to wave him back. “I can do it.”

“The equipment here is fiddly,” Tailgate said. “Once you get it in, rotate clockwise or it'll pop right back out.”

Cyclonus let Tailgate get the fuel line seated with a bemused smile and brought the recharge cable to his temple. “Thank you,” he said. Followed by: “What are you doing?”

Whirl looked around, but Tailgate was already scurrying off to help Orion and there really wasn't anyone else Cyclonus could be talking to. “Recharging?”

“Give that to me,” Cyclonus demanded, pulling the cable out of his claws. With a gentle scrape of his nails, he found the latch over Whirl's recharge hookup and plugged him in. Whirl jumped a little at the buzz and Cyclonus took advantage of his distraction to get the fuel line connected to his primary fuel port.

“I didn't need help,” Whirl commented, scooting down to lie down with his helm braced on his arms. The dang grated cage floor dug into his plating but still—recharging was a rare luxury outside the medstation, Whirl intended to savor it.

Cyclonus snorted. “You're as bad as Scourge,” he said.

 

* * *

 

Cyclonus's arm, wrapped supportively around his waist as they entered the elevator, pulled him close as the doors closed. “You were magnificent,” he rumbled in Whirl's audial.

“You weren't so bad yourself,” Whirl said. Not that he'd seen any of Cyclonus's fights. He'd only delayed his trip down to the medibay so Cyclonus could have his prize.

Not that he cared one way or the other.

“You do this with all the warriors back in the day, or just the pretty ones?” Whirl asked as Cyclonus nuzzled his face against the side of Whirl's helm. Cyclonus might have _said_ he was interested in kissing, but he seemed awfully fixated on the hugging part.

Cyclonus huffed a laugh. “I was Galvatron's Second.”

“I don't know if that's a yes or a no.” Whirl pointed out.

“Good,” Cyclonus said, pressing a soft kiss to one of Whirl's barbels. “Let's get you to the medic.”

“What if we just stayed here?”

The door chimed. “Next time,” Cyclonus murmured.

 

* * *

 

 

The creature screamed, flailing its barbed tail. Cyclonus, apparently undisturbed, cracked his neck and stretched his arms. Whirl scooted closer to the edge to get a better view.

Someone had clearly decided that it was more fun to set Cyclonus on creature fights, where he was free to rip things to shreds. Whirl didn't mind—Cyclonus didn't like fighting the other prisoners; you could see it in his pinched frowns after those fights.

Cyclonus shuffled his legs into a broad stance, waiting for them to release the creature. He stamped his foot. Then he did it again and a low noise echoed through the space.

It was a moment before Whirl realized what it was: Cyclonus was _singing_.

The creature sprang, released from its cage and Cyclonus rolled beneath it, coming up in time to stomp again in time with the beat. It was a low rumble, the song, practically a dirge.

“What's he singing, Legs?” Whirl asked.  
   
Tailgate shook his head, transfixed. “I’ve never heard anything like it.”

“It's a dirge,” Dai Atlas said.

“I noticed. Pretty gloomy,” Whirl agreed.

“No, I meaning is that it is a song of mourning. He's singing it for the creature he must kill.”

“Wow, what a sappy bastard,” Whirl said, watching as Cyclonus finally rounded on the beast and snapped its neck.

 

* * *

 

“I'm bored,” Whirl announced. “Do you ever do anything?”

Cyclonus shifted his gaze over to him. He appraised him silently, then looked back away. “I am thinking.”

“You're staring out into space again, but it's not even into _space_ , you're just staring at the wall. What's on the wall that's so interesting?”

“What would you prefer I do?” Cyclonus asked. There was a hint of amusement in the question, one that clearly spelled out what _Cyclonus_ would prefer to do but Whirl was not going to cave and look mushy in front of the others. He had a reputation, damn it.

“Tell me about Cybertron,” Whirl suggested. “Old Cybertron, before the Functionists took over. What was it like?”

“It was perfect,” Cyclonus said. Then, after a moment, he amended: “In was, in many ways, unjust. Before Nominus, leadership shifted with the winds and only at the cost of lives. The wealth of higher culture was not permitted to many. You were not free to live as you chose except by permission of your liege lord.”

“And your lord? Galvatron?” Whirl asked. “See, the thing I don't get and—here's the thing. Lord Galvatron is this big hotshot warrior, right? Could fight his way through an army single-handed or whatever hot slag they're feeding the sparklings these days. So why in the hell did he need a bodyguard?”

“I was not his _bodyguard_ ,” Cyclonus corrected. “I was his Warrior Second.”

“Nobody will tell me what the fuck that means.”

“It means that on the field of battle I surrendered my body and loyalty for the survival of the soldiers under my command,” Cyclonus said crisply.

“So you belonged to him?”

“My loyalty belonged to him.”

“I don't see the difference.”

“It doesn't matter anymore.” Cyclonus said. “He is dead now.”

 

* * *

 

 

“I am unvincible!” Whirl crowed, hopping up in the air to click his heels together. Poor Fort Max glared at him from his place on the ground but he wasn't _dying_ ; he was fine. Whirl had fragging won and he intended to celebrate.

“Did you see that, Hobgoblin?” He shouted up to Cyclonus. Cyclonus was watching him, he was always watching him. It occurred to Whirl that, absent any major injuries today, they'd have no excuse to slip off into the elevator together. Dang it. Maybe Cyclonus would get run over in his fight later.

 

* * *

 

“Geez, you guys, Cy apologized for the vampiring,” Whirl complained, stepping over Tailgate to investigate the damage. “No need to hold a grudge.”

“Cy?” Skids asked, hands on his hips. “And we don't have a _grudge_ , we have self-preservation instincts. Right Windcharger?”

Windcharger nodded his agreement, hands still bracing his jaw from where Cyclonus had definitely dislocated it. Windcharger was the more dangerous of the two—when his power dampener was turned off for matches he could throw even Turmoil around like a rag doll. Usually he was circumspect in that power; what with the “no killing“ rule.

“We're going downstairs first,” Whirl announced. “Get the gate, Legs.”

“I can help you carry him,” Tailgate offered, letting go of Cyclonus’s hand to help lift his legs.

“Nope, I've got this,” Whirl said. “Look after Windy and Slippers over there, make sure their boo-boos aren’t too bad. Wouldn't want them holding a grudge against _me_ too.”

“I’ll help you carry him to the elevator,” Tailgate said and Whirl relented. Cyclonus was damn heavy as dead weight.

After Whirl shooed Tailgate back out and the door closed behind them; Whirl flopped onto the floor on top of Cyclonus. “Tell me you didn't let them do that to get me in here,” he said, tracing his claw around Cyclonus's broken horn, the one he still refused to get fixed. Cyclonus shivered.

“I couldn't wait another week,” he said.

Whirl didn't say that that didn't sound like the casual morale-boosting warrior flings Cyclonus had promised. He _was_ capable of internalizing his thoughts, whatever Skids said. “We've got to be quick,” Whirl said, eyeing the door. The medibay was a long way down but—

Cyclonus grabbed his shoulders and pulled him within reach, sucking kisses into the sensitive plating on Whirl's neck. Whirl was sure that when they dragged themselves to their feet at the opening of the door that someone would notice the stains on his plating but, well, it's not like the Consortium surgeon cared.

 

* * *

 

Cyclonus went under, the bruiser who'd hit him following him to the floor. Whirl decided he'd had enough.

His feet fit neatly into the gaps of the wire cage as he climbed up and threw himself over the side. “Look out below!” He yelled. He straightened himself out like an arrow, like a javelin, like a...like something that would go satisfyingly shlunkt if you drove it through your enemy's skull.

The energy barrier should have splattered him, but it winked out at just the last second. Whirl figured the show-masters had to like him—what made better entertainment than chaos? They certainly indulged him on occasion.

Regretfully, the brute who he was aiming for moved out of the way before Whirl could test his javelin theory. He landed and spun, swiping their feet out from under them. Then he turned and offered Cyclonus a hand up.

Claw up.

Same difference.

Cyclonus took the offered claw and hauled himself to his feet. “You are not supposed to be here,” he said.

“And you're not supposed to let them hit you,” Whirl said. “Looked like you were having an off day, thought you could use an assist.”

“Is this not the sort of “getting into trouble“ you've warned me against?” Cyclonus asked. He surveyed their assembled foes, who were spreading out around the edge of the ring, the one who'd landed the hit shuffling back to join his companions.

“If I don't do something stupidly impulsive every once in awhile people will think I'm losing my touch,” Whirl said, turning to face the other half of the ring. “How many do you think you can take down?”

“Are you here to fight, or count?” Cyclonus said.

 

* * *

 

An enormous hand grabbed him around the ankle, which was all the warning Whirl had before he was suddenly upside-down with his helm several feet off the cage floor. Turmoil grabbed his other ankle before Whirl could kick him, grip tight like a vise.

“I was trying to sleep, you behemoth!” Whirl said.

“You’re trying to get us all killed,” Turmoil growled.

Impactor stalked into Whirl’s flip-flopped field of vision and _of course_ Impactor couldn’t even threaten Whirl without back-up. “What the frag was that?” Impactor growled. “They should have let you fry.”

“Knew they wouldn’t.”

“And how did you know they wouldn’t punish the rest of us for _you_ breaking the rules?” Impactor snarled. “I ain’t dying for you and I’m not seeing anyone else hurt either.”

“If you’re going to hit me then hit me, I’m trying to nap,” Whirl said.

Just then the elevator chimed and Whirl found himself dropped in a heap. He rolled himself to his feet and hopped over to the gate, rubbing at his ankles and glaring at Turmoil. When the doors opened on Tailgate and Cyclonus—positioned on opposite sides of the elevator and looking as awkward as hell—Whirl dropped the limp and waved cheerily. “Oh good, you’re back! I was getting bored of the company here.”

 

* * *

 

Once upon a time, Whirl had owned a chrono shop. It'd had a cracked front window and a dodgy keypad access and a nice tall workshop bench where Whirl had done his repairs. It hadn't been great, but he’d been able to afford rent and once his business took off he would have been able to move somewhere nicer.

When the government heavies had come to wreck his shop, Whirl had hidden under that workbench. It had been one of few few pieces in the place that hadn't been broken or thrown out onto the street and the space beneath it's lower shelf had been just the right size to hide.

In some ways, the space under the washrack bench was a nostalgic hiding spot.

Unfortunately, some people were more perceptive than the Senate’s thugs.

Cyclonus didn't say anything when he spotted Whirl but Whirl knew he'd been spotted. Cyclonus walked over and sat down on the floor, hands resting lightly in his lap. And then he waited for Whirl to crack.

“What gave me away?” Whirl asked lightly.

“I have led soldiers through many battles,” Cyclonus said. “You're not the first person who's tried to conceal the extent of their injuries from me.”

“I'm fine,” Whirl said.

“You have crawled downstairs to hide under a bench, because you are fine,” Cyclonus repeated.

“Okay, yeah. It hurts a bit when I...well, when I anything. But its not deathly. I'm—I'm like you. Religious objection to going to the doctor.”

“You aren’t religious.”

“I'm not going.” Whirl said. He'd made up his mind, he wasn't going to deal with that slag today. If he survived to the morning then future him could deal with the Consortia's surgeon.

“I cannot convince you,” Cyclonus decided. He got back up and walked away, leaving Whirl confused and—okay, a little hurt. He figured Cy would have at least tried a little harder. He’d thought…

The door opened again and Whirl saw the lower legs of three people exit the elevator. “You absolute snitch!” he yelled.

Tailgate ran to the bench and flopped down beside Whirl, patting at his plating in alarm. “Cyclonus says you’re hurt,” he said.

“Because he’s an absolute fucking snitch.”

“You’re getting out of there right now so Thunderclash can look you over,” Tailgate said. “And then he’s deciding if you need to go to the medic.”

“I can’t believe you.”

“Whirl,” Tailgate whined. “Please.”

Whirl ran through his repertoire of Dead End curses and then the ones he’d learned in prison. “Just drag me out by the neck, throw me down the elevator shaft and have done with it,” he finished, dragging himself out so that Cyclonus could see the gesture he made with his claws.

“Whirl!” Tailgate said. “Not in front of Cyclonus.”

“It’s fine,” Cyclonus murmured, hand brushing Tailgate’s shoulder as he stepped up to Whirl. “I’ve heard worse.”

“I hate you,” Whirl muttered, as he lifted his arms to let Thunderclash survey the damage. You didn’t need a damned medical degree to predict what he was going to say.

“You’re leaking internally,” Thunderclash said. “And you’re going to bleed out if you don’t get this fixed. I’m sorry but you’ll have to go downstairs, there’s nothing I can do for you here.”

“I hate you too,” Whirl muttered. The atmosphere was getting a bit thin for his tastes, so he sat back down. Tailgate was saying something, probably telling him off for being rude to Thunders. Whirl visualized himself filling up with fuel, head sinking under the waves and engulfing all the noise around him.

A hand touched his claw and Whirl tried to shove them away. “No,” he rasped. “Won't go.”

“What do you fear more than death, little bird?” Cyclonus whispered in his audial. Whirl shivered.

“I’m not scared,” he lied. “I’m just tired.”

“You’ll feel better soon,” Tailgate promised.

He’d feel worse first, but he let them take him down.

 

* * *

 

 

“So, uh, that should be it,” Tailgate stumbled, releasing Cyclonus's hand. He pulled the detailing kit into his lap. “Looks okay?”

Cyclonus lifted his hand to study the fresh sharpness of his talons against the low lights beneath them. “It will do,” he said, and brought his hand back to rest in his lap.

“Right, oh. Alright. Well, um, if you need anything else, let me know. It's my job to keep you all looking and, uh, fighting your best.” Tailgate said, looking away.

“Thank you, Tailgate,” Cyclonus said.

The little mech squeaked and hurried off to offer one of the others a hand with polishing.

Whirl chuckled. “I think he likes you,” he said.

“Do not be absurd,” Cyclonus said with a flick of his hand. “I am only doing as you suggested and helping him feel needed here.”

“Well, you are the only guy his age. You two should hang out more. Talk about old people stuff.”

“He is no more interested in me than anyone else,” Cyclonus pronounced, though his newly polished, mirror sheen frame said otherwise. “And I do not “hang out“.”

“Suuuure,” Whirl agreed. “Course not.”

 

* * *

 

 

Cyclonus looked over at him from the other side of the washrack, frame wreathed in steam. Whirl crossed the floor in what was probably three steps. It felt like thousands.

Whirl threw his arms around Cyclonus and squeezed. “Don't you dare scare me like that again,” he said. Cyclonus's frame was still hot enough to vaporize cleaning solvent, but Whirl held on.

“I did not intend to,” he said. “I lost my footing.”

“I don't want to hear excuses,” Whirl said, squeezing Cyclonus hard enough to lift him off his feet. “You're not allowed to die. And certainly not by falling in a smelting pool. That's just undignified.”

“I did not realize you cared about my dignity,” Cyclonus said.

“Shut up and kiss me,” Whirl said, setting him back down on his feet.

Cyclonus looked over at him in surprise that shifted almost instantly to delight before being swallowed by stoic reserve.

“If that is what you wish,” he said with a warmth that couldn't be repressed, before stepping down onto one knee and gathering Whirl's claws into his hands. Slowly, worshipfully, Cyclonus lavished those claws with kisses. Whirl felt like bottle rockets were going off in his brain, fear and protectiveness and something else all wrapping themselves up in knots.

The door slammed open and Cyclonus froze. Whirl swiveled to see who it was and winced.

“You're down here canoodling?” Tailgate shrieked. “I was terrified! You were missing and I was scared _sick_ that you were dead.”

“It's not what you think, Legs,” Whirl said, trying to buy time, trying to pull Cyclonus back to his feet but the stubborn aft was frozen still.

“You know you’re not supposed to jam the gate doors to use the elevator! And since I _stupidly_ assumed you wouldn’t do that, you were both just _gone_ —“

Whirl tried again. “It’s not what you think! We're not, like, lovers or anything. This is purely platonic, uh, old school warrior tradition. Yeah! Cyclonus was all sentimental for the old days of warriors having brotherly bonds or whatever and asked me to help him do some reenacting.”

“I don't care about that!” Tailgate sniffed. “I care that you let me think Cyclonus was dead!” He spun on his heel and ran out of the room, optics sparking.

“Go on!” Whirl said, pulling away from Cyclonus. “Go after him!”

Cyclonus frowned. “Why?”

“Because he _likes_ you, obviously! And you like him back!”

Cyclonus frowned harder. “I don't follow.”

“It's really fucking obvious. Tailgate’s the only thing you stare at more than the walls. You ask me questions about him all the time. Go on, if you hurry you can catch up to him.”

Cyclonus shook his head. “I thought, you and I, we had come to feel the same way?”

“Invested in each other's mutual survival and appreciating each other's company?” Whirl suggested lightly.

“I thought that we were lovers. I did not realize you were still, after all this time, merely trying to placate me.” Cyclonus rose to his feet and finally did turn away. “That you would throw me at the first mech who seemed slightly interested...”

“Hey, I'm not the one who made the bro code!” Whirl protested. “You set the rules. This was always just kissing for morale.”

“Was it?” Cyclonus asked sharply.

Whirl walked in front of him. “Do you need me to say it first?”

Cyclonus breathed: “Yes.”

“Then fine!” Whirl snapped his claws in frustration. “Your scheme worked, all right? I have weird and confusing spark feelings for you and I don't know what the fuck to do with them. But it doesn't matter—because Tailgate likes you and you like Tailgate and you _deserve_ Tailgate. You're both good people. And I'm me.”

“I am interested in Tailgate, yes,” Cyclonus agreed. “But I would never leave you for him.”

“They broke me.”

“You are not broken. I do not believe it could be done,” Cyclonus said.

“I can't hold you. I can't kiss you. The only thing I'm good for is wrecking shit.”

Cyclonus reached over and pulled Whirl in to rub their helms together. “That is not true. But even if it were, I'd be content to love you all the same.”

“Oh.”

Whirl thought about it for a bit. “You should go after Tailgate.”

Cyclonus growled with annoyance. “Do not make me say it again.”

“No! No, this is cool. I, uh, need some time to get used to the idea. But, wow: feelings, am I right? What a crazy world. But here's my thought, maybe it's dumb. I don't know, maybe you've got religious convictions and it wouldn't work or whatever. But yeah: why not have the both of us?”

“What?”

“Well, we're all trapped here and are probably going to die gruesome deaths millions of miles away from home so, really, why not? I think Tailgate is great—he's a good friend. You two like each other, why not get together? Who's going to judge you? Turmoil? Impactor? Do you really care about any of their opinions?”

“No.” Cyclonus agreed. “But he isn't interested in me like that. It’s like you said—we’re peers in age and so I can offer him a window into a culture he has lost.”

“Sure, sure, which is why he came down here all in a tizzy because he thought you were smelted. Look, I'm not suggesting you sweep him off his feet and kiss him. Didn't you old fashioned mechs used to go courting? Give him gifts, spend time together, that sort of thing.”

“I own nothing and I cannot go anywhere,” Cyclonus pointed out.

“I'm not your relationship coach! Just do something. Teach him some of your romantic poetry. Minibots love poetry.”

Cyclonus smiled. “I'm not sure I've ever met anyone who was as alive as you are.”

Whirl wasn't sure what that meant, but his brain—try as it might—couldn't seem to find a way to parse it as a veiled criticism. “I'll try to keep it up then, Handsome,” he said, just to see Cyclonus smile again.

 

* * *

 

 

Whirl could barely bear to watch them, even over the tips of his claws. Cyclonus walked over, then paused fifteen steps away and stared out into space as if he'd merely ambulated over to stretch his legs. Tailgate sproinged about like he was magnetized; drawn closer and closer only to ping away at the last second if Cyclonus happened to make eye contact. It was ridiculous.

“I'm three minutes from writing a “do you like me, yes or no“ note for you,” Whirl yelled helpfully. “And I don't have anything to write on _or_ with so you best bet I'll get creative!”

Everyone in the cage turned to stare at Whirl. Cyclonus frowned severely, but that was basically his default face. Tailgate looked mortified.

Whirl shrugged. “What? Are you telling me you all _haven't_ noticed they like each other?”

“I'd noticed,” Turmoil growled from his little loner corner.

“Thank you,” Whirl said. “See, even No Friends noticed and he doesn't have any friends.”

“Who are we talking about?” Fortress Maximus asked. His brother leaned over to whisper something to him.

“You better not be planning anything with Tailgate,” Skids said, crossing his arms across his chest and trying to stare down Cyclonus. “We all look out for Tailgate and nobody's going to let you take advantage of him. He's our friend.”

“Woah, woah, woah, what are we all talking about here?” Tailgate asked, waving his arms. “Cyclonus isn't interested in me! Not me...me? Boring old me. He's busy canoodling with Whirl.”

“And outrageous lie if I've ever heard one,” Whirl said.

“Is that why you two have been so reclusive lately?” Impactor jeered. “Makes sense. Two freaks, you're meant to go together.”

“Drillbit, I am not going to tell—”

“Hey, Whirl isn't a—”

Whirl and Tailgate tried to respond at the same time, when Cyclonus burst out: “Would you all be quiet!” He looked around and pointed at Whirl, crooking his finger to get Whirl to come. “I do not enjoy people speculating about my private affairs,” Cyclonus continued. “But I would rather not waste the time we have left here. Yes, I am courting Whirl.”

“Courting?” Whirl repeated. “Since when?”

“You know when,” Cyclonus said. He turned to Tailgate. “But, little one, you are also so beautiful and so brave. I would be honored to court you as well.”

Tailgate clapped his hands to his face. “But that's—but, me? Me?”

“See, he's not interested, freak,” Impactor said.

“Let us keep our tempers in check,” Thunderclash said, rising to his feet with Dai Atlas shortly behind him. _Those two_ had been mighty cuddly lately, not that Whirl had said anything about it. Nearly as bad as Orion and Soundwave, who spent all their time plugged in with that fragging transfer cable sharing love notes or something.

“Oh, now I'm the one in the wrong for suggesting that _maybe_ the little janitor doesn't want to mash faces with a murdering—”

“Stop it!” Tailgate stomped his foot. “I can speak for myself. Just because I'm short doesn't mean I need you all making my decisions for me.”

“And what is your decision?” Cyclonus asked.

“Um, yes?” Tailgate said. “I don't really know what “courting“ entails but if it means I get to spend time with you, I'm in.”

Cyclonus bowed. Just a little but: still. He bowed, like he was taking part in a historical reenactment or something. Whirl barely restrained the urge to laugh.  Then Cyclonus, apparently having used up all his public speaking points, walked away to the corner of the cage and sat down.

Whirl was about to despair again, but Tailgate gamely trotted over to Cyclonus and plopped down beside him.

“So, if you're courting Whirl and you're courting me, and courting Whirl means that you kiss him, does that mean you'll kiss me?” Tailgate asked.

 

* * *

 

 

“So, how are things going with you and Tailgate?”

“This is hardly the time, or the place,” Cyclonus growled. He made a valiant attempt to knock Whirl over with a kick to the stabilizing fin.

Whirl dodged away. “What? No, this is the _best_ time and place. Only time I can be absolutely 100%, without-a-doubt certain that there aren't any little panicky guys listening in. So, how's it going with you and Tailgate? I heard your singing practice yesterday. I mean, everyone heard your singing practice. That was singing, right?  We were pretty sure it was that or someone being killed by inches.”

“It was singing.” Cyclonus said. He caught Whirl's kick and flipped him, sending him flying. Frag, Whirl hated that move, “And you still talk too much. I've said it before, if you're fighting then fight.”

“That was my line, I think.”

“So we're agreed.”

“Nope, nuh-uh, not getting out of it. How are things with the little leggy guy? I mean, he seems pretty smitten, I think—”

Cyclonus bowled him over and growled into his audial. “Things are good.” Then he grabbed Whirl's helm and slammed it into the ground, blackening out the arena.

 

* * *

 

Whirl poked his head around the doorway, then ducked back out. Cuddle time for the two of them, apparently. Well he wouldn't want to get in the way of—

“Whirl.”

He poked his head back around the doorway again. Cyclonus was staring at him.  

“Yes?”

“Get in here.”  Cyclonus ordered, waving a claw to point at the other side of the bench beside him.

 As he approached, Whirl realized that Tailgate, curled up small on Cyclonus's other side with his head resting in his lap, was asleep. Whirl perched lightly on the edge of the bench on the other side. “What do you want?”

“I could say the same to you,” Cyclonus murmured.

“I was just looking around to see where you'd gone. No sign of you up in the cage.”

“You have been avoiding me,” Cyclonus said, leaning his head against Whirl's shoulder and pulling one of his claws into his lap. “Are you unhappy with our arrangement?”

“Avoiding you?” Whirl asked. “Me? I have been doing no such thing. I've just been giving you two a little space, let you enjoy your honeymoon period as much as possible. Not a lot of privacy here.”

“Ah.” Cyclonus said. He lifted Whirl's claw to inspect it and frowned. “When did you last clean these?”

“Do I look like the kind of guy who keeps track of that slag?” Whirl said. He snipped his claws together and noted the grinding noise with a wince. Probably some rust or crusted energon caught in the hinge.

Cyclonus ignored him and reached down under the bench to pull out one of the detailing kits. “Let me,” he said.

Well, Whirl wasn't going to complain if Cyclonus wanted to give him a claw massage. “Whatever you want,” he said.

Cyclonus fussed at him for a bit in stoic silence, washing out the accumulated grime and then buffing off any scratches and smoothing in a coating of polishing wax. When he was satisfied, he held out his hand expectantly for the other claw.

“You could have Tailgate do this,” he pointed out. “He helps everyone else with their maintenance.”

“I know,” Whirl said. “I don't like letting people touch me.”

Cyclonus flicked his optics up to Whirl, pausing at his attentions.

Whirl groaned. “Not including you, obviously.”

“Obviously,” Cyclonus repeated, deadpan. But he went back to his work. “Many things are not obvious to me, I must admit.”

“Oh?”

“I did not expect my feelings to be returned, by either of you,” Cyclonus said. “I did not prepare myself for the possibility.”

“I wouldn't worry about it,” Whirl said, scooting his legs out to slouch down onto the bench as best he could. “Me and Tailgate are losers, we have no idea how courting is supposed to work.”

“I don't know either.” Cyclonus said. He shook his head. “I have led you to believe I know what I am doing, but I have no experience in things such as this.”

“Hey, you're a pretty good kisser,” Whirl said, “That's something.”

“That's all I have,” Cyclonus said. “I was Galvatron's Warrior Secondus. There was no one but him who could claim me as his lover and he did not choose to do so.”

“I gotta say, you do not make the “Golden Age“ sound like very much fun.”

“My status had its advantages,” Cyclonus said, but not with a lot of enthusiasm. “I was given the opportunity to study and pursue scholarship above my rank.”

“But you're a soppy bastard, you didn't want prestige and rank and all that slag. You wanted someone to care,” Whirl pronounced.

Cyclonus looked at him, then looked away.

“Well, mission accomplished, I guess.” Whirl said, throwing his arm over Cyclonus's shoulder. “Twice, even! Only downside is that you have to live in this hellhole to get it.”

 

* * *

 

“Dinner time!” Whirl cheered, throwing himself to his feet. He did a little dinner dance, then swung around to look for Tailgate. Who was...nowhere in sight. “Hey, Cy, where's Tailgate?” Whirl asked.

“He received a message and went downstairs,” Cyclonus said from where he was lurking by the gate.

“Weird,” Whirl mused, “what do they want the little guy for right before recharging time? He's supposed to be up here to help.”

“I do not know.” Cyclonus frowned harder. Now that Whirl was paying attention, he noticed the tension in his frame: chin ducked to his chest, his hands clenched into fists with his nails biting into his plating.

“It was a rhetorical question,” Whirl said. “Look, I'm sure he's fine.”

“I'm sure he is,” Thunderclash said firmly, stepping over to join them. “I'll assist with distributing the hookups.” Thunderclash was tall enough to reach the recharging station without sitting on anyone's shoulders and, as the mech who handled their non-emergency medical care, everyone was at least cordial with Thunderclash. But that didn’t do anything for Cyclonus, who looked inches from rattling himself apart.

“Hey, you gotta recharge,” Whirl said when Cyclonus tried to push the offered fuel line away. Cyclonus glared.

Whirl took the lines from Thunderclash with a shake of his head and walked them over to Cyclonus. Whirl leaned close and pitched his voice low. “What has you so freaked out? He goes down there all the time.”

“You said before that they did not care what we did.”

“Well, we're not allowed to kill each other, but other than that? Got years of supporting evidence for that theory. Why?”

“We had just kissed when they called him away,” Cyclonus said.

“Could be a coincidence.”

“Seconds earlier.”

“Recharge,” Whirl insisted. “Whatever's going on down there, you and I can't help. There’s no way down without Tailgate to open the door.”

Cyclonus took it but he never let his optics drift from the gate that blocked his way to where Tailgate was. He was still staring when Whirl finally drifted off.

 

* * *

 

 

Whirl startled awake to a tiny hand tapping him in the claw.

“Whirl!” Tailgate whispered. “I need to talk to you!”

“What?” He squinted blearily at Tailgate. “Oh. It's you. Where were you?” He looked around for Cyclonus and found him staring at them, his face frozen in horror.

Tailgate winced. “I need to talk to you. _Right now._ ” He pulled on Whirl's claw, dragging him to his feet and then to the gate and then through it to the elevator beyond. The doors closed behind them, but Tailgate didn’t move to push either of the buttons. “They know,” he said, voice thick with fear.

“Who knows what?” Whirl asked.

“Them. The Consortia. They know about us.”

“Mm-hmm.” Whirl agreed, nodding. Clearly the little mech was all shook up. “Well, we weren't exactly subtle.”

“Whirl!” Tailgate cried. “Take this seriously! Me and Cyclonus aren't allowed to be together. They said if I—if I spoke to him again they would—” he sank down to the floor and buried his face in his hands. “What am I going to do?” He sobbed.

“Wait, just you and Cy? What about me and—”

“They don't care about you and him,” Tailgate spat. “According to the creep they sent to bully me, “being with a freak like that is punishment enough“. They knew you two were together—they think it's funny. It's only when I get a chance at happiness that they—that they—”

“Okay, deep breaths,” Whirl instructed. “Don't panic. Don't do one of your panicky things, you know I'm rubbish at comforting people. We're just going to wait them out, put the breaks on things. They'll forget about this eventually and then the two of you can be together again.”

Tailgate poked his face up to look at Whirl. “When have they _ever_ forgotten anything, Whirl? This is just the way it's going to be.” He took a deep breath. “I need you to tell Cyclonus. Don't let him fight this, okay? And don't tell Cy they're doing it to punish him. I don't want to hurt him.” Tailgate reached over to the corner of the elevator and jammed his fingers under one of the floor panels.

Whirl jumped up. “Woah!” He almost said something about property damage and dire consequences but Tailgate had already pulled his prize from out of the hidden space behind the panel and sealed it closed again.

He held it up to Whirl, who inspected the proffered object for a moment before taking it in his claws. It was white and pointed, with a slight curve to it and after a moment Whirl realized what it was meant to be. “Tailgate.”

“Tell him he has to take it. It was going to be a—” he sniffed, “—a conjunx ritus gift. But don't tell him that. Tell him it's my goodbye present.”

“You know he refuses to get that horn fixed.”

“Please,” Tailgate said. “I'm going downstairs. Tell him that if he wears that I'll know that he's not upset with me for—for breaking it off.”

“Tailgate, wait,” Whirl said. He stepped down to one knee and opened his arms. “Come here.”

Tailgate let Whirl hug him.

“I am so sorry, little guy,” Whirl said. “You deserve him so much more than me. You don't deserve any of this.”

“Will you do it?”

“I'll do it,” Whirl said. “But someday I'm going to find myself face to face with one of those Consortia blaggards and I can't promise I won't put my fist through their face when I do.”

 

* * *

 

 

Cyclonus was not a mech of small emotions, Whirl knew. But there was nowhere to escape, nothing to destroy,  no way to vent the pressure. He forced his hands away from his face, freckled with pinpricks where his claws had punctured the surface. He knelt and let Whirl replace his horn.

And then he threw himself against the wall and began to climb the chainlinks. Whirl had a moment where he could see Cyclonus reach the top and throw himself over the edge, down into the smelting pool below. He had to shake his head until the real Cyclonus, still at the top of the wall, blanked out the morbid mental image.

He began to sing. Not one of the battle songs he’d taught to Tailgate, with their patriotic vigor. It was an ugly sound, the notes lost somewhere between song and scream.

He sang until there was no more sound in him and when he climbed back down he didn’t speak again.

 

* * *

 

 

Things were weird. Things had never _not_ been weird, the entirety of Whirl's life. But the last few months had taken on a routine that had been absolutely shattered by the Consortia's meddling.

Whirl and Cyclonus were on break. Whirl wasn't surprised, though it cut him that Cyclonus wouldn't let him touch him.

Cyclonus and Tailgate were like actors in a farce. They pretended, badly, that they couldn't see each other. Neither of them talked to each other. Neither of them were talking to _anyone_.

Their bad moods had spilled out into the rest of the cage, or maybe it was the fear of the Consortia interfering in everyone else's affairs as well. Certainly the few couples Whirl had noticed had suddenly grown less affectionate. Soundwave and Orion had stopped using their neural linkup cable. Dai Atlas and Thunders had lost their contraband fullstasis set. The Orion Pax fanclub talked amongst themselves in subdued tones and even Impactor seemed less brash.

Whirl? Whirl was angry. It was all he could feel lately, a singing, stinging feeling that poured out of his spark and lit his brain on fire. He wanted to hit something—he wanted to hurt someone—he wanted to hurt himself. When he next got into the ring he was going to do all three, with relish. In the meantime he cleared out space in the cage by shadowboxing invisible enemies and narrating their grisly ends at his hands. _At his hands_.

All the while, his head was just a pounding chant, a single voice, a single linear thought without break or interruption: soon.

 

* * *

 

His head was pounding. It felt like the battlefield was tinged energon-pink. Or maybe that was the fuel running into his optic.

Whirl dragged himself back to his feet and swung around, looking for Impactor. “You call that a hit, Drillbit?” He said. “Tailgate could hit harder.”

He had been egging Impactor on the whole fight, winding him up like a clockwork toy. He was waiting for his work to pay off.

“Shut up!” Impactor roared and the next blow knocked Whirl flat on his back in a shock of pain.

He snarled but the thing in his head wasn't satisfied. It wasn't enough. “I can see why the miner's rebellion failed, if their leader was this much of a coward,” he spat.

He saw the inevitable coming far too late to realize the voice in his head had been wrong, that this wasn’t what he wanted.

Impactor turned and swung, drill hand forward, and Whirl didn't have the strength to dodge. There was only a tiny buffer space between his optic lens and his brain module. Only a few seconds between when the pain started and when it stopped.

 

* * *

 

He hadn't felt pain like this since his empurata. It was like someone had opened up his helm and poured molten metal inside.

But hey, you couldn't wish you were dead unless you were alive.

His hearing returned slowly, booming like he was standing in the back of a long hallway. The words were all a smear, but he recognized a voice.

“Cy?” He asked, or tried to. He wasn't sure if any sound came out, but the hand on his shoulder—there was a hand on his shoulder, he realized—tightened its grip.

Cyclonus said something, but the pain picked it to the bones and left it unrecognizable.

“Am I dying?” Whirl asked. Oh slag, he was in so much trouble. If he died there was no way the Consortia wasn't going to mete out punishment. He'd been so distracted by the anger and the voice and the singing in his frame that he'd forgotten _why_ he'd never acted on those constant impulses towards self-annihilation.

“No,” Cyclonus said. He said other things, but the only part Whirl caught was “going to fix you.”

“Keep Tailgate out of here,” Whirl begged. “Don't want him to see.”

Cyclonus let go of him and he sank back down into the smelting pool of pain.

 

* * *

 

 

The pieces came to him all jumbled, like the guts of a chrono spilled across a workbench. He was alive. The ceiling above was white, familiar. His optic was unbroken. The stench of the room, all ozone and dried energon, was familiar. He couldn’t move. The Consortia surgeon, with his predatory smile, was painfully familiar.

“Ah, awake at last. I wasn’t sure if you were going to make it,” he said. “That would have been unfortunate for all of us.”

Whirl stared at the ceiling and didn’t bother to reply. He wished he could at least remember the incident where he’d earned the surgeon’s especial hated, because he would have loved to see himself choke the life out of the creep. The image would have brought him a lot of comfort in the times when he ended up down here.

“By any rights you should be a pile of scrap metal right how. And you all went such a long time without a slip-up, too…” he trailed off, inviting Whirl to ask the question.

Whirl asked it. “What do you want?”

“The right thing to do would be to report to my superiors that you and that other one conspired to break your contract. But...perhaps I could be persuaded to tell them it was only an accident.”

“Right. Yeah, I got that part. What do you want?” Whirl knew where these games always ended up and the fragger already had him sedated, so he was a  little lost on what _he_ was supposed to contribute to the event.

The surgeon responded to Whirl by pulling out his gun and pushing it up against Whirl’s optic. “Do not try me,” he hissed. “I would be _happy_ to report both the conspiracy and your death.”  
   
After a long moment, the surgeon lifted his gun and set it aside on his workbench. “Beg.”

Well damn, that was not one of Whirl’s specialties. “It was an accident,” he said. “I promise.”

“No, not that. I don’t want you to beg for your life. I want you to beg me to hurt you.” He reached over and plucked a wicked looking instrument out of the top drawer, a needle as wide as his finger and the cord connecting it to the wall socket twice as thick. “I want to see you swallow your pride and beg, mechanical scum.”

Whirl tried. For Tailgate, he tried. Tailgate, Cyclonus, and all the rest. Luckily, the current hitting his sensornet quickly reduced his pathetic attempts to staticked croaking. The surgeon never could seem to stop himself once he got a taste.

Whirl had been in prison for a long time before being turned over to the Consortia and he’d been on the Senate’s bad side before they were replaced by the Functionists. He’d developed opinions on weapons of torture. Ones that put the voltage inside of you were his least favorite. His sensornet alternated between more sensation than it could process and a deep unsettling blankness. His spark broiled in his chest like a landmine in boiling oil, ready to blow.

The surgeon let up for a bit when Whirl’s vision started fritzing out. “I’ll let you recover your voice for a bit,” he said, tapping the tip of the needle against Whirl’s plating to see the sparks arc and dance.

It felt like forever before Whirl could talk again. “Please…” he rasped.

“Please what?”

Whirl’s brain had never been good of thinking of the right things and in that moment, it decided perversely to supply Whirl no words, only with the ghost of the sensation from several weeks back when he’d last been held tight in Cyclonus’s embrace. “Just do it,” he whispered.

“Why?”

Whirl had no idea what he wanted. “Because I’m bad. Because you want to. Because I deserve it. Please just—“

The surgeon drove the needle deep into Whirl’s shoulder and the sparks swallowed up the rest of his desperate fumbling. The force of it threw Whirl to the side, his optic facing the door.

By that happenstance, he got to see the moment Tailgate opened the door, Cyclonus following at his heels with a concerned frown on his face. And damn Whirl for not saying more, for not making it more clear to Cyclonus that Tailgate _could not be here_.

It was what he'd always feared, and worse. For a bot with no mouth, Tailgate had always been remarkably expressive. Whirl watched him cycle from worry to horror to awful, crystalline realization. And then, without enough time to do anything to stop him, to righteous fury.

Cyclonus realized his mistake, but he grabbed at Tailgate too late to catch him as he strode into the room, picked up the first weapon he saw—the doctor's gun that he had set aside earlier—and put a single shot through his helmet.

The alien went down like a helicopter caught by a mode lock.

Tailgate kept the gun leveled on his still form. “Cyclonus, get Whirl,” he ordered.

“What have you done?” Cyclonus said, even as he rushed to do exactly what Tailgate had ordered.

He pulled the needle free and Whirl squawked, in an undignified and staticky voice, “What are you _doing_?”

“I've got this,” Tailgate said grimly.

“You absolutely do _not_ got this,” Whirl said.

“What was I supposed to do, let him torture you?”

“Yes!”

Cyclonus knelt down and pulled the helmet free, inspected the corpse. “You both need to leave,” he said. “I was the one who did this. No one else was here.”

“Cyclonus, you can't do that.” Whirl said.

“I must.” He looked over at Tailgate and hesitated. “You understand, don't you, little one?”

“Whirl's right,” Tailgate whispered. “It doesn't matter who did it, so it might as well have been me.”

Cyclonus stood and looked between them and, for the second time in as many minutes, Whirl got to see someone he loved realize an awful secret. “You always said that we would not be the ones punished for misbehavior,” he said slowly.

“Yeah,” Whirl said.

“Obsolescence chip,” Tailgate said. “The Functionists use them for population control. Remote-activated killswitch that melts your brain. The Consortia never wanted me, but when they realized that I was the only one the rest of you all liked...I was the perfect leverage.”

“You never said.”

“It would only have hurt you.”

“So this is it, then,” Whirl said. “Damn, I hoped I'd go out on my feet.”

“If it's the standard sedative, he keeps an antagonist in one of these drawers,” Tailgate said, finally putting down the gun and going to hunt through the cabinets. “You should both go upstairs.”

“That's cute,” Whirl said. “But it's not happening. Nah, I figure if I'm going out, going out avenging you...that's pretty much the only way all this could have ended. What about you, Cy?”

Cyclonus stared at the wall, like he could see the fabric of the universe on it's blood-splattered white paint. “You will not die here,” he pronounced. “Get him on his feet, Tailgate. We are going upstairs.”

 

* * *

 

 

“No,” Soundwave said.

“We would all die trying,” Skids said.

“I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't have anything left to live for here,” Orion said.

“We cannot win,” Cyclonus said. “But we can take them down with us. Would you rather die here, slowly, by inches, in indignity? Or would you come together and get your just revenge?”

“Tell them the plan again,” Whirl said in the silence that followed.

 

* * *

 

 

They forced the Consortia to come up and meet them in the ring.

When all was said and done, there were only so many methods for the Consortia to subdue them without coming in the arena. Whirl wished he could have seen the look on their little faces when they realized Tailgate's obsolescence chip wasn't receiving a signal.

Because, sure, the Consortia held the advantage in numbers, in weapons and in equipment. But they didn't didn't have the Outliers.

As Cyclonus had predicted, the doctor had had the equipment necessary to remove the inhibitor cuffs. Using the linkup cable, Soundwave was able to use his abilities to shield Tailgate. Tailgate sank offline with his little hand clutched in Cyclonus’s; consciousness and chip signal hidden out of reach. “Keep him close and don't let go,” Cyclonus had ordered, before striding away without a goodbye. The crisp, staccato battle orders were giving Whirl an idea of what Cyclonus had been like as Galvatron's lieutenant.

Freed to use their alt modes and on-board weaponry, it took one shot each for Fort Max, Pious and Turmoil to blow the chains that held up the cage, sending them all hurtling to the ground. Everyone pushed close to the center, to narrow the forcefield Trailbreaker had to project to get them through the energy shield.

It overloaded with a pyrotechnic show that wouldn't have been out of place in a vid about Primal Vanguard. The other bits of the cage were torn and mangled, but the forcefield held long enough to get them to the ground.

Then it was Windcharger's turn. He turned to face the stupid, ostentatious, designer smelting pool and used his powers to scour the walls with molten metal, destroying the remaining remote defenses and the surveillance equipment. The walls were prettier with a light coating of fire and molten metal, Whirl thought.

The first leg of his plan accomplished, Cyclonus had surveyed the troops, rearranging their position to get the exhausted Windcharger and Trailbreaker close to the center beside Soundwave. By this point the voices on the announcements were already screaming at them to surrender.

“Dai Atlas,” Cyclonus said as he rushed back to the front of their phalanx. “You should lead us.”

“Don't let old notions of propriety catch you now,” Dai Atlas said, lifting his sword to inspect its edge. “We will fight under your command.”

“Side by side,” Thunderclash said, putting a hand on Dai Atlas's shoulder. “As we should always have been.”

So. They forced the Consortia to come up and meet them.

Whirl had been in a lot of fights, but he'd never seen people die like the first rush of Consortia guards. The only way they had out into the ring was the hatchway in the center of the ring, and it was narrow enough to force them to come out two or three at a time. That first rush didn't realize that without their mode-locks the prisoners would be able to return fire with fire.

The fight was nothing like a match in the ring; where they’d all been dragging it out to play the cameras and do as little permanent damage as possible. It happened so fast Whirl could barely track it as people fell and soldiers screamed and gunfire roared. He landed that backwards 360 kickflip he’d been practicing for months and didn’t even get a moment to appreciate the victory before a flash of laserfire clipped his left stabilizer.

He staggered and someone offered him a hand up. It was Impactor. Whirl took a moment to stare in disbelief and then let Impactor pull him back to his feet. “Too damn many of them,” He said.

“Talk with your fists,” Impactor yelled, putting his drillhand through a soldier’s helmet.

“I don’t have fists!” Whirl yelled, using his cockpit guns to take a guy out at the kneecaps.

“I’m being rhetorical!”

“I know!” Whirl yelled back.

Across the ring, Fortress Maximus pushed part of the remaining cage wall up like a shield to narrow the enemy's movement, and his brother circled around to brace it. “Push forward!” he yelled. “We can take the station.”

Whirl saw Cyclonus's frustrated snarl as the others rushed to do just that, but the mass of prisoners did not wait for orders. They pushed into the narrow tunnel, following behind their makeshift shield, entirely abandoning their superior tactical position. Whirl pushed to get close to Soundwave and Tailgate. “We have to follow them!” He yelled.

The tunnel was narrow and dark, the only lights the blare of muzzle fire and the cacophony of biolights reflecting off the metal walls. The noise was beyond belief. Whirl tried to keep close to Soundwave, who was putting so much focus into blocking the signal to Tailgate's chip that he wasn't going to be able to protect himself from a physical attack. The Maximus brothers were _supposed_ to be guarding him.

The fight spilled out into a new world, a brightly lit hangar with spark-blue walls and orderly ranks of Consortia soldiers. Whirl got a glimpse of the long-barreled blasters in their hands before the world lit fire.

Whirl threw himself over Tailgate and Soundwave, knocking them to the ground as the explosion ripped overhead.  The noise was beyond belief. “Trailbreaker!” He heard Cyclonus roar. “Shield!”

The noise muffled as a yellow glow obscured the blue walls around them. Whirl pushed himself to his knees and looked around.

Trailbreaker was on his knees, hands held high as he pushed his forcefield out as far as it could go. He was already shaking. Whirl was giving it a minute, tops, before he collapsed.

There were downed bodies everywhere, but Whirl wasn't sure who was dead or not. Cyclonus was there at the front with Thunderclash, leaning over the mangled body of... _slag_ , Dai Atlas. The old warrior held up his sword with a shaking hand. Cyclonus exchanged a look with the dying man's lover. Then he glanced over at Whirl, only for an instant. He took the sword.

The blade glowed like a hotspot as Cyclonus stepped smoothly to his feet and turned to face the enemy. “Those who can stand, do,” he ordered. “Windcharger, disarm as many as you can.”

“This is not the end,” Soundwave whispered. “He’s here.”

Whirl looked for Orion, certain that was who Soundwave had to be referring to, but he was up at the front with Cyclonus.

Whirl had expected the firing to start the moment the forcefield broke, but it didn't. He looked around their rag-tag team in confusion, no answers in sight. But there at the front, Cyclonus was glaring down a Consortia guard who'd broken away from the front of their formation.

The guard was holding up a hand to his troops, and they held their fire. “You were right,” the guard said. “You couldn't be tamed.” He reached up to lift off his helmet. Whirl recognized him then—the same pitspawned bastard who'd cut off Cy's horn at the end of their first match.

Cyclonus regarded the guard coldly. In his hand the Great Sword shone like a beacon, like a floodlight, like some great and holy thing.

“I have hated every part of this posting,” the guard continued. “The mundanity of it. The boredom. But I admit, for all your flaws, you have been my chief source of entertainment on this miserable space station. I've been listening and I admit I am intrigued. You were, as they say, a “second soldier“, correct?”

Cyclonus nodded warily.

“That is some feudal sounding nonsense, that is. You surrendered your loyalty to the enemy just to guarantee the survival of some foot soldiers?”

“They were _my_ soldiers,” Cyclonus said.

The guard grinned. “So loyal. So loyal that I wonder— do you feel the same way about this...group? If I promised to spare them, would you become _my_ monster?”

Cyclonus froze as still as death.

“No,” Whirl whispered. It was Cyclonus who'd given the speech about how much better it was to die with dignity than live as slaves. He wouldn't dare—

“You would release them in their own ship? They would be free to leave?” Cyclonus asked slowly.

“If those were your terms, sure. You're worth a hundred soldiers, which is good because you've killed at least that many. You're wasted on bloodsports when we could have you on the front lines.”

Cyclonus glanced over his shoulder and Whirl realized that he would do it. No matter how long the odds, no matter how great the sacrifice, he would _always_ take the option where Whirl and Tailgate got to live, even if he had to forge the sword to throw himself on.

He could see Cyclonus gathering himself to speak and he wanted to scream, but couldn't figure out what he could say that would change the awful truth of it—that this _was_ the better option in every way Cyclonus cared about.

Whirl reached for Tailgate’s still frame and shook him by the shoulder. “Tailgate, I need you,” he said. But there was no rousing him with Soundwave still linked in.

“Wake him up,” he said.

Soundwave wasn’t looking at him. “He's here,” Soundwave said.

“Lay down your weapons, for the survival of the Black Box Consortia!” A voice boomed, just as a huge bay door opened to reveal a huge spaceship docked just beyond the airlock. It was purple with red fins and even though Whirl had never seen it before, he knew the ship was Cybertronian built. He knew it even before he saw the person who had spoken—a brightly armored Consortia official, walking side by side with a massive grey Cybertronian.

“Who is this?” The guard asked, waving at the mech. Solidly built—a mineworker's frame if Whirl didn't miss his mark.

“This is Megatron of Tarn,” the alien said. “And the chief signatory on the Consortia's Nonaggression pact with the Cybertronian rebels.”

“What rebels?” The guard asked.

The glittery alien clucked his tongue. “Oh dear, this is a backwater. Regardless: stand down. We are releasing the prisoners to Megatron as a sign of goodwill to seal this treaty.”

“But I was—”

“Stand down.” The man in charge—maybe he was a general or something fancy like that—turned to Megatron. “Take your people and go.”

Megatron surveyed the prisoners—no, he scanned the crowd as if looking for someone. Orion found him first, stepping up to throw his claws around Megatron's shoulders. “You came.”

“I promised.”

“Excuse me, _what?_ ” Whirl said.

 

* * *

 

 

The shuttle bay doors opened and Whirl rushed inside, catching Tailgate at a run and swinging him onto his shoulders. Cyclonus slowly descended the shuttle steps and walked over to them, sword slung over his shoulder and his face splattered with black ichor. He caught Whirl staring and smiled ruefully.

“We ran into more trouble than the captain expected,” he said.

“I'll say!” Whirl said. “If I'd known that diplomatic missions got exciting I'd have volunteered to come along in the first place. Everyone in one piece?”

“We're fine,” Cyclonus said. “Let's go home.”

Life had a different pace on the Last Light than it had had in Consortia space. There, time had dragged between the fights. Here, there was a driving sense of urgency and every moment between missions was savored like sweet smoked engex. No one's time was infinite.

Their escape had been a surprise to everyone, even the two who had been in contact with Megatron. Soundwave and Orion—the secretive bastards. Orion had gotten his hands on a contraband transmitter and radioed out to an old friend who'd escaped the purge, only to get the captain at that frequency instead. He'd known it wasn't safe to continue the conversation by radio, where the Consortia would be free to spy on them, and had gone to Soundwave as an intermediary. When they’d lost contact with the Last Light, both sides had assumed the worst.

Nobody said that the only reason Megatron had diverted the Last Light was to rescue them all was because he was smitten but, hey, Whirl could read between the lines.

They'd been offered safe passage to the nearest mech friendly planet, but Cyclonus would never have taken that offer. Not when saving Cybertron was in the cards, no matter how faint their chances. And Whirl had to admit, after everything that'd happened in his life, a quiet retirement sounded boring.

A least on the Last Light they had their own room, one with a huge berth—well, two berths Whirl had pushed together—where they could all lay curled on top of each other. That's where Cyclonus always wanted to go after danger.

He'd pull them close, close enough that Whirl could feel the pulse of his spark beneath his chestplate.

He didn’t get to do that right away this time, because Tailgate wasn’t a fan of alien viscera in the berthroom. Instead they headed to one of the washracks. Not quite the same as the sterile washracks of the Consortia prison, but Whirl was still a fan—the perfect place to steal a private kiss or two.

When they were ready to head back, Whirl danced in front of the door and caught Cyclonus with his claw. “I think that counts as a fight,” he said with a wink of his optic. “Where’s my post-battle kiss?”

That derailed their leaving for another few minutes.

On the walk to the room, Tailgate rode on Cyclonus’s shoulders, Whirl walking alongside with his arm wrapped loosely around Cy’s waist. “Hey Cy,” Tailgate said out of the blue. “We love you.”

Cyclonus stopped right there in the hallway, jaw working with no sound coming out. He still wasn't good at the words. They were working on it.

“And I...love you both,” he whispered.

“We know.”

**Author's Note:**

> Scene I couldn't include because B99 wrote the joke first:  
> Thunderclash: "You're bleeding internally."  
> Whirl: "Awesome. That's where the blood is supposed to be."
> 
> Big thanks to choomchoom, who beta'd this fic _twice_ because it needed so many edits the first time through. 💕
> 
> Also! I mentioned the idea of empurata!Orion Pax on Discord once and [Matt drew the thing](https://twitter.com/palaciosworks/status/1059870670992027648)! You should check it out because it's great.  
> \--
> 
> I haven't been much of anywhere lately because I've been writing a lot, but I do check my mentions on tumblr/twitter (I'm notwhelmedyet everywhere I go) and my comments here regularly. I love comments of all kinds so please free to tell me what you thought!


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